. 


litlPil 


LI  B 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 
OF    ILLI  NOIS 


From  the  Library 

of  the 

Diocese  of  Springfield 
Protestant  Episcopal 

Church 
Presented  1917 

UNIVERSITY  OF 
ILLINOIS  LIBRARY 


A  I   UKBAWA-CHAMPAKTi 

ILL  HIST.  SURVEY 


'I! ' 

*m:^i 
,-'»*,  ;Jkf 


^JS^.;m;W 


:  ..,  * 


TO  THE 


RT.  REV.  WILLIAM  C.  DOANE 


(BISHOP  OF  ALBANY) 


IN  REFERENCE  TO  THE 


CONSECRATION  OF  THE  RT.  REV.  DR.  BROOKS, 

(BISHOP  OF  MASSACHUSETTS.) 


BY   THE 


BISHOP  OF  SPRINGFIELD. 


LETTER  OF  THE  ARCHBISHOP  TO  CANON  CARTER,  RELATIYH 
TO  THE  CASE  OF  THE  REV.  VANCE  SMITH. 

"I  confess  that  I  do  not  understand  the  frame  of  mind  that  would  lead 
a  teacher  of  religion  to  protest  against  the  Nicene  Creed,  and  at  the  same 
time  to  join  in  a  solemn  service  of  which  that  Creed  and  its  doctrines  form, 
from  the  beginning  to  tlie  end,  so  prominent  apart.  Neither  can  I  under- 
stand any  one  feeling  it  right  to  invite  to  our  Communion  Service  a  teacher 
of  the  Unitarian  body  which  so  protests.'1'' 

—LIFE  OF  AKCHBISHOP  TAIT,  Vol.  2,  p.  70. 


SPRINGFIELD,  ILL.: 

THE  H.  W.  EOKKER  PRINTING  HOUSE. 
1892. 


COPYBIGHTED  1892.  BY   GEORGE  F.  SEYMOUB. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGES . 

PREFATOKY  NOTE — 

Reasons  for  delaying  the  publication  of  the  letter — "Why  it  is  not 
worth  while  to  present  the  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  for  trial — The 
real  issue  at  stake 1-3 

THE  OPEN  LETTER  TO  BISHOP  DOANE 5-43 

1.  Reasons  for  addressing  Bishop  Doane 5 

2.  Reasons  for  publishing  the  open  letter 6,7 

3.  The  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks'  theological  position  made  manifest  by 

himself  for  years 8-10 

4.  The  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks'  course  as  a  clergyman  of  the  Church  ir- 

reconcilable with  his  belief  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity. .     10,11 

5.  The  Church  clear  and  decisive  in  her  formularies  on  this  and 

other  points 11 , 12 

6.  The  steps  which  the  Bishop  of  Springfield  took  to  secure  the 

Church  as  to  the  soundness  of  faith  of  the  Bishop-elect 
before  consecration 13 , 14 

7.  Embarrassment  occasioned  by  the  secrecy  maintained  by  the 

Bishops,  who  have  charge  of  the  voting,  after  the  result  was 
reached — the  system  faulty — remedies  proposed 14,15 

8.  The  cases  of  the  Bishops  of  Hereford  and  Exeter  in  England — 

Bishop  Doane's  extraordinary  method  of  reasoning 15-17 

9.  Bishop  Doane's  constituency  immense:    Why? 16 

10.  Demas  and  St.  Luke  types  of  character 18-20 

11.  Our  times  test  men,  and  compel  them  to  show  their  real 

character 19 

12.  The  philosophy  of  the  day  careless  of  truth — Calvinism  re- 

sponsible for  a  great  deal  of  this  laxity  in  the  realm  of 
truth. .  21 


.471975" 


11. 

PAGE. 

OPEN  LETTER—  Continued. 

13.  Illustration  of  this  tendency  in  the  "charitable  hypothesis" 

theory,  touching  regeneration  in  the  Baptismal  Office 22-25 

14.  The  effect  of  this  immoral  treatment  of  the  declarations  of  the 

Church  of  God  leads  to  the  Cummins  Schism 23 

.15.  Further  effects  in  the  free  handling  of  God's  word;  the  fluxing 
the  Creed  and  Offices  with  new  meanings,  and  the  denial 
of  the  verities  of  the  Gospel 26 

16.  The  interpretation  theory  as  applied  by  certain  men  in  theo- 

logy, if  put  in  practice  by  them  in  business  would  probably 
consign  them  to  prison 27 

17.  "Closed  Questions."    Christ  and  His  Apostles  and  the  Catho- 

lic Church  have  closed  them 27-29 

18.  The  episcopate  past  and  present  one.    Its  testimony  settles 

forever  for  churchmen  the  fundamental  truths  of  revelation.          29 

19.  Partisanship  to  be  distinguished  from  fidelity  to  the  central 

truth  of  Christianity.  The  issue  in  the  Bishop  Brooks  con- 
troversy is  whether  Christ  in  His  Person  is  eternal  or  a 
creature.  The  charge  of  partisanship  is  unfounded  in  fact.  30,31 

20.  The  principles  on  which  men  administer  trusts  in  business 

affiairs  reversed  by  some  Bishops  in  dealing  with  the  case 

of  Bishop  Brooks 31 ,33 

21.  The  precedent  which  the  case  of  the  Bishop  of  Massachusetts 

establishes  for  the  future 33 ,34 

22.  The  argument  urged  by  certain  Bishops  from  precedent  in 

favor  of  confirming  Bishop  Brooks,  thrown  into  a  syllo- 
gism. The  fallacy  of  such  reasoning 34-36 

23.  The  Bishops  who  gave  consent  to  Bishop  Brooks'  consecra- 

tion, condemn  their  own  action  in  their  declaration  on 
Christian  Unity,  iand,  in  some  instances,  in  individual 
utterances 37 , 38 

24.  The  constituency  and  commendations  of  Bishop-elect  Brooks 

must  distress  all  conservative  Christians 38 

25.  The  position  of 'the  Bishop  of  Springfield  touching  this  Con- 

secration restated 39 ,40 

26.  Frightful  illustrations  of  anomia  and  disloyalty  exhibited  by 

Clergymen  in  the  Church 41 


111. 

PAGE. 

OPEN  LETTEB — Continued. 

27.  The  real  root  issue  involved  in  this  Consecration,  unless  re- 
traction is  made  or  satisfactory  explanation  is  given,  is 
Christ  or  antichrist , . .  42 , 43 


APPENDICES. 


APPENDIX  I.  The  Bishop  of  Springfield's  Circular  Letter,  addressed 
to  all  the  Bishops  exercising  jurisdiction  in  the  United  States, 
as  a  warning  to  investigate  the  teaching  and  practice  of  the 
Rev.  Dr.  Brooks,  before  giving  consent  to  his  Consecration , 45-47 

APPENDIX  II.  Letters  addressed  by  the  Bishop  of  Springfield  to  the 
Rev.  Dr.  Brooks,  with  a  view  to  obtain  from  the  Bishop-elect 
such  explanations  as  would  clear  up  the  case. — The  Rev.  Dr. 
Brooks'  replies 48-56 

APPENDIX  III.  Letter  addressed  to  the  Presiding  Bishop,  urging  him 
to  approach  the  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks  to  obtain  some  retraction  or 
explanation 57-59 

APPENDIX  IV.  Protest  of  the  Bishop  of  Springfield  against  the  Con- 
secration of  the  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks 60,61 

APPENDIX  V.    Unitarian  Baptism  of  the  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks. — Damaging 

commendations 62-67 

APPENDIX  VI.  Pelagianism. — The  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks'  avowal  of  his 
holding  this  teaching. — This  teaching  in  conflict  with  Holy  Scrip- 
ture and  the  Church. — The  Rev.  F.  W.  Robertson's  erroneous 
teaching. — Answer  to  the  same. — Excuse  made  for  the  Bishop  of 
Massachusetts  would  not  be  accepted  in  any  other  sphere  of  life.  68-77 

APPENDIX  VII.  Arianism. — Letters  of  the  Rev.  Dr.  E.  E.  Hale  and 
the  Rev.  Dr.  James  Freeman  Clarke. — Remarks  on  the  same. — 
Archbishop  Tait's  testimony,  and  that  of  the  Convocation  of 
Canterbury 78-90 

APPENDIX  VIII.  Apostolical  Succession. — Bishop  Brooks'  avowed  po- 
sition in  regard  thereto. —  Quotations  from  Prayer  Book  and 
Canons- — The  gift  of  life  on  every  hand  comes  to  us  from  the 
Life  Giver  by  succession 91-97 


IV. 


APPENDIX  IX.  "Closed  Questions":  A  Pastoral  Letter  of  the  Bishop 
of  Springfield  to  his  Diocese,  showing  that  for  Churchmen  there 
are,  by  their  own  consent,  questions  that  are  forever  settled 98-108 

APPENDIX  X.    Declaration  of  the  Bishops  of  the  American  Church  on 

Christian  Unity,  at  the  General  Convention  of  1886 109-111 

APPENDIX  XI.    Illustrations  of  Bishop  Brooks'  course  in  word  and  deed 

since  his  Consecration 112-121 

APPENDIX  XII.  Bishop  Doane  on  the  "alleged  invitation,"  as  he  calls 
it,  given  to  Unitarian  Ministers  by  the  Kev.  Dr.  Brooks,  and  on 
Keligious  Orders,  and  the  Eev.  F.  W.  Puller's  reply  in  London 
Guardian,  with  remarks 122-133 

APPENDIX  XIII.  Partisanship  alleged  by  certain  Bishops  as  a  charge 
against  those  who  opposed  the  Consecration  of  Bishop  Brooks. 
The  charge  refuted 134-141 

APPENDIX  XIV.    The  apparent  haste  with  which  the  arrangements  for 
-  the  Consecration  of  the  Et.  Eev.  Dr.  Brooks  were  made  and  an- 
nounced.— A  remarkable  paragraph  from  the  New  York  Times, 
with  Biohop  Doane's  explanation 142-144 

CONCLUSION  AND  NOTE  . .  . .  .144-148 


PREFATORY  NOTE. 


This  letter  would  have  been  printed  long  ere  this  had  I 
not  waited  to  see  whether  the  suggestion  of  his  friends, 
when  they  were  urging  the  confirmation  of  the  Bishop-elect 
of  Massachusetts,  on  the^  ground  that  when  he  became  a 
Bishop  he  would  improve  and  show  himself  a  different  man, 
would  be  verified  in  the  event. 

I  have  waited  in  vain.  This  assurance  of  his  friends,  so 
monstrous  in  itself,  that  one  who  has  proved  disloyal  in 
subordinate  positions  would  become  faithful  and  true  when 
advanced  to  a  higher  office  and  entrusted  with  greater 
responsibilities,  generated  a  hope,  wfyich  has  proved  utterly 
fallacious.  The  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  has  not  improved, 
and  the  Boston  press  has  in  effect  told  us  "we  knew  as 
much  all  along,  when  his  friends  were  urging  Dr.  Brooks' 
confirmation  under  the  assurance  that  he  would  make  a 
change  in  his  teaching  and  conduct  when  he  was  conse- 
crated a  bishop.  Dr.  Brooks  is  not  the  man  to  alter  his 
convictions  or  his  conduct.  We  knew  as  much  all  along." 
Such  is  the  sneer  with  which^  the  friends  of  Bishop  Brooks 
comment  upon  his  acts  and  words  of  anomia  now  that  he 
is  the  Bishop  of  Massachusetts. 

I  have  not  been  deceived.  I  knew  full  well  what  was  com- 
ing. But  it  was  wise  to  wait,  since  it  might  have  been 
claimed  by  the  same  deluded  friends  of  the  Bishop  of  Massa- 
chusetts, who  were  loud  and  persistent  in  saying,  "make 


him  a  Bishop  and  he  will  cease  to  utter  and  do  what 
shocked  the  Church  when  he  was  a  Presbyter,"  it  might 
have  been  claimed  by  them  and  others,  that  I  had  printed 
my  letter  before  he  had  time  or  opportunity  to  show  his 
-character  as  a  Bishop  in  the  Church  of  God. 

Ten  or  eleven  months  have  elapsed  since  Dr.  Brooks  was 
consecrated,  and  by  word  and  deed  he  has  endorsed  all 
that  he  said  and  did  as  a  Presbyter. 

Again  it  may  be  said,  why  not  present  the  Bishop  of 
Massachusetts  for  trial?  I  answer,  because  in  his  case  it 
seems  to  me  utterly  useless,  since  on  the  authority  of  a 
Bishop,  who  has  better  opportunities  for  knowing  whereof 
he  affirms  than  most  of  his  brethren  enjoy,  two-thirds  of 
the  Bishops  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  the 
'United  States  gave  consent  to  Dr.  Brooks'  consecration. 
'They  knew  full  well  Dr.  Brooks'  position  as  a  fautor  of 
Unitarians,  as  an  avowed  Pelagian,  and  one  who  repudi- 
ated with  something  of  scorn  and  pity  for  those  who 
held  it,  the  doctrine  of  the  Sacred  Ministry  as  embodied 
in  our  Ordinal.  They  knew  all  this,  and  yet  the  Presiding 
Bishop,  and  with  him  a  majority  of  the  Bishops  say,  as 
in  the  presence  of  God,  and  awaiting  the  just  judgment  of 
God,  "let  him  be  made  a  Bishop,  we  do  not  consider  these 
acts  unrepented  of,  these  words  unretracted  or  unexplained 
inconsistent  with  his  making  the  promises  of  the  Ordinal 
and  taking  the  Episcopal  oath." 

Is  there  any  hope  that  these  Bishops,  possibly  two-thirds 
of  the  American  Episcopate,  who  say  in  1891,  let  him  be 
made  a  Bishop,  will  in  189£  consent  to  his  condemnation? 
It  would  be  stultification  pure  and  simple. 


God  knows  what  awaits  our  Church.  The  outlook  is  dis- 
tressing', numbers  may  increase,  money  may  accumulate, 
temporal  prosperity  may  abound,  but  the  faith  is  dying 
out,  truth,  honor,  manhood  are  at  a  discount.  Cerinthus 
is  in  the  splendid  bath-house  with  its  soft  appointments 
of  luxury  and  voluptuousness  and  ease,  but  St.  John  has 
fled  poor,  homeless,  naked,  Patmos  awaits  him,  and  the 
boiling  oil,  and  a  long,  long  life  of  confessor  ship.  May 
God  sive  me  grace  to  endure  whatever  He  may  allow  to 
be  visited  upon  me  for  doing  in  my  poor  and  humble  way 
all  that  I  can  to  maintain  the  faith  once  delivered  to  the 
Saints,  and  to  uphold  the  order  and  discipline  of  the 
Church  of  Christ. 

My  contention  in  the  pages  which  follow  is  not  that 
Bishop  Brooks  is  wrong  in  his  Arianism,  Pelagianism,  and 
Congregationalism,  but  that,  as  holding  these  convictions, 
he  has  no  right  to  remain  in  the  Ministry  of  the  Church, 
which  condemns  in  its  authoritative  declarations  such 
teaching.  He  has  no  right,  moral  right,  to  enter  the 
Ministry,  advance  to  its  highest  place  and  remain  in  it 
with  a  view  to  upset  its  foundations,  reverse  its  ecumeni- 
cal decisions,  and  turn  it  literally  upside  down.  He  has 
no  moral  right  to  do  this,  since  meanwhile,  until  he  ac- 
complishes his  purpose,  he  is  obliged  to  say  that  he  believes 
what  he  does  not  believe,  and  take  part  in  offices  and 
functions  which  he  regards  as  worse  than  childish  folly.  I 
cannot  reconcile  such  a  position  with  moral  rectitude  and 

manly  honor. 

G.  F.  S. 

SPRINGFIELD,  ILL.,  Sept.  1,  1892. 


•\ 


AN  OPEN  LETTER 

To  THE  BISHOP  OF  ALBANY  IN  KEFERENCE  TO  THE  CONSE- 
CRATION OF  THE  BlSHOP  OF  MASSACHUSETTS, 

THE  RT.  REV.  DR.  BROOKS. 


KT.  REV.  AND  DEAR  BROTHER: 

You  need  feel  no  surprise  at  my  selection  of  yourself,  as 
the  public  recipient  of  this  letter,  however  much  you  may 
be  unprepared  for  its  appearance  at  this  time,  and  from 
my  hand.  As  a  friend  I  can  address  you  without  the  sus- 
picion of  personal  ill  feeling ;  as  one  with  whom  in'  large 
degree  I  have  been  in  the  past  in  theological  accord,  I  am 
free  from  the  imputation  of  partisan  bias,  and  as  making 
yourself,  though  late  on  the  field,  conspicuously  active  and 
zealous  in  promoting  the  confirmation  and  consecration  of 

the  present  Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  you  commend  your- 

o 

self  to  me  as  the  one  of/  ^ft  .Brethren,  who**  I  ought  with- 
out any  hesitation  'to  associ£te  V7j?on  mJself  before  the 
public  in  the  statement,  wj^  "follows. 

I  am  fully  aware,  iPsT^ear  Brother,  of  the  grave  responsi- 
bility, which  I  ««*ninie  in  taking  this  step,  but  I  am  as  fully 
convinced  of  tfce  obligations,  which  impel  me,  as  a  Bishop 
in  the  Church-  of  God,  to  taVe  it. 


6 

I  have  done  rny  utmost  to  avert  the  sad  necessity,  which 
now  shuts  me  up  to  this  last  resource,  as  circumstances 
have  shaped  themselves  and  events  have  occurred,  to  free 
my  conscience,  and  vindicate  my  honor. 

The  imputation  has  been  repeatedly  made,  and  more 
frequently  implied,  that  those,  who  were  opposed  to  the 
consecration  of  the  Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  on  the  basis, 
on  which  he  was  known  to  stand  as  a  Presbyter,  without 
retraction  or  explanation,  had  not  the  courage  of  their 
convictions,  and  were  afraid  to  speak  out,  and  this  sug- 
gestion I  have  felt  more  keenly,  since  our  dear  Brother  of 
Western  Michigan  seemed  to  stand  alone  before  the  public 
in  wielding  his  pen  and  lifting  his  voice  against  the  conse- 
cration as  it  took  place,  and  it  seemed  pusillanimous  that 
others,  who  shared  his  convictions  and  sympathies  should 
keep  silence.  But  even  these  considerations  would  not  have 
determined  me  to  address  the  Church  at  large,  were  it  not, 
that  as  the  case  now  stands,  the  safeguards,  which  sur- 
round the  Episcopate  in  our  land,  have  received,  as  a  con- 
siderable number  of  the  Bishops  believe,  a  blow,  which 
weakens  them,  and  prepares  the  way  for  stifling,  if  not 
sik>ncing  the  witness,  which  we  must  bear,  if  we  are  true  to 
our  Master,  to  the  faith  once  delivered  unto  the  saints.  You 
yourself  epitomise  the  danger,  >'£en  you  say  in  your  ad- 
dress to  your  convention  of  ^91, v  "For  myself  I  am  free 
to  say,  that  knowing  a  mL  to  be  hfyiorable  and  respon- 
sible I  should  hesitate  to  refuse  nv  consent  to  his  conse- 
cration, if  he  were  willing-*b  take  upon  himself  the  solemn 
consecration  vows."  (Convention  Address,  p.  ig.)  On  these 
terms  with  the  views,  which  are  accepted/ and  Advocated 


by  a  school,  unhappily  largely  represented  in  our  Church, 
you  would  admit  to  the  Episcopate  men,  whose  lips  would 

% 

take  oaths,  to  which  their  hearts  consented  not,  who  would 
fill  the  old  bottles  with  new  wine,  who  would  flux  the  creeds 
and  offices  with  strange  meanings,  and  avow,  as  they  rose 
from  their  knees,  interpretations,  which  would  shock  you. 
These  men  are  reputed  to  be  "honorable  and  responsible," 
and  they  avow  and  justify  their  course  of  action  without 
reserve. 

In  view  of  such  a  chivalrous  declaration  as  to  your  course 
in  the  future  in  admitting  men  to  the  Episcopate  on  the 
one  hand,  and  the  rapid  increase  of  a  school  on  the  other, 
whose  philosophy  enables  them  without  dishonor,  as  they 
think,  to  set  themselves  free  from  the  binding  force  of 
human  speech  as  the  expression  of  thought,  you  see  how 
extremely  important  the  force  of  a  precedent  becomes,  and 
hence  I  am  driven  to  the  conclusion,  that  nothing  short  of 
the  discussion  upon  which  I  now  propose  to  enter,  and  the 
facts  which  I  now  proceed  to  submit  in  reference  to  this 
consecration,  will  free  my  mind  from  guilt  in  the  realm  of 
conscience  and  as  awaiting  the  judgment  of  the  last  great 
day. 

Under  these  impelling  causes  I  am  forced  to  speak  out, 
and  I  feel,  my  dear  Brother,  that  I  am  indebted  to  you  in 
your  frank  and  magnanimous  avowal  of  your  purpose,  as 
touching  your  consent  to  future  consecrations  for  the  rea- 
son, which  leads  me  to  address  this  letter  through  your 
doubly  honored  name*  to  the  whole  Anglican  Communion. 


*  The  Et.  Eev.   Dr.  George  Washington  Doane,  Bp.  of  New  Jersey  was  the 
Bather  of  the  Bishop  of  Albany. 


8 

I  have  said  that  I  did  my  utmost  to  prevent  the  sad 
necessity,  which  no\v  constrains  me  to  write  this  letter.  I 
will  briefly  recapitulate  tbe  course  which  I  pursued  and  the 
steps  which  I  took  in  order  to  secure  the  Church  against 
the  intrusion  into  our  episcopate  so  far  as  I  knew  then, 
and  now  know,  of  one,  who  repudiated  her  polity,  con- 
temned her  faith,  and  showed  little  or  no  respect  for 
her  law  and  order.  My  apprehensions,  you  will  particu- 
larly observe,  were  grounded  upon  the  Bishop-elect's  OWN 
ACTS  AND  WORDS,  not  upon  hearsay  evidence,  or  popular 
rumor.  I  recognized  the  salient  fact  that  for  years  the 
distinguished  Presbyter  of  Massachusetts  had  attracted  to 
himself  the  attention,  and  secured  the  sympathy  of  an  im- 
mense constituency  of  people  hostile  to  the  polity  of  the 
Church,  and  in  large  proportion  repudiating  what  we  con- 
sider the  fundamental  verities  of  the  Christian  Faith,  by 
proclaiming  himself  in  word  and  deed  as  more  liberal  than 
the  system  into  which  he  had  voluntarily  entered,  and  un- 
der which  he  was  allowed  to  live  and  serve  in  consequence 
of  the  vows  which  he  had  deliberately  taken,  as  he  was  ad- 
mitted to  Holy  Orders,  those  namely  of  the  diaconate  and 
of  the  priesthood.  These  acts  and  words  were  not  few,  but 
many,  they  were  not  confined  to  one  occasion,  and  a  single 
year,  but  they  were  conspicuously  before  the  public  for 
many  years,  so  that  the  name  ci  the  Bishop  of  Massachu- 
setts was  a  tower  of  strength  for  the  sectarian  and  the  un- 
believer in  his  assaults  upon  the  Church,  as  represented  in 
her  ordinal,  and  creeds,  and  offices,  and  articles,  hence 
while  I  was  as  ready  as  any  one  could  be  to  acknowledge 
all  that  was  claimed  by  his  ardent  and  enthusiastic  ad- 


9 

mirers  for  the  eminent  Presbyter  in  question,  I  felt,  and 
I  was  compelled  to  feel  grave  distrust  as  to  his  fitness  to 
be  admitted  to  the  Episcopate.  I  am  not  saying  that  the 
Rt.  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks  was  not  in  the  abstract  right  in  all 
that  he  has  said  and  done,  that  is,  I  am  not  arguing  the 
question  whether  Congregationalism,  Arianism  and  Pel- 
agianism  be  true  or  false,  of  course  the  Church  Catholic 
condemns  these  teachings  as  errors,  but  I  am  saying  that 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  ordinal,  creeds,  offices  and  ar- 
ticles of  the  Church  in  their  plain  and  obvious  meaning,  he 
was  manifestly  in  a  mistaken  position,  and  hence  distrust 
•of  his  fitness  for  the  Episcopate  was  forced  upon  me  by  his 
own  course  as  a  Presbyter  of  the  Church,  through  many 
years  of  a  very  conspicuous  ministry. 

This  case  then,  you  will  observe*,  was  fundamentally  dis- 
tinct from  any  which  has  ever  occurred  in  the  history  of 
our  Church.  There  have  been  instances  where  opposition 
has  been  made  on  the  ground  of  partisan  antipathies  and 
suspicions  engendered  by  those  prejudices,  but  the  present 
is  separated  from  all  such  by  the  fact  that  the  candidate 
himself  is  the  cause  of  all  the  painful  doubt  and  misgiving, 
and  the  points  involved  are  not,  in  any  sense,  questions 
which  divide  the  Church  into  schools  of  thought,  but  issues 
which  reach  down  to  the  bottom  truths  of  Christianity. 

If  the  Bishop-elect's  religious  convictions  were  to-  be  in- 
terpreted by  his  words  and  deeds,  and  associations  run- 
ning through  a  long  series  of  years,  then  his  theological 
position  as  to  the  incarnation  seemed  to  be  that  of  an 
of  some  sort,  as  regards  man's  natural  condition, 


10 

that  of  a  Pelagian,  and   as  touching   ecclesiastical  polity, 
that*, of  a  Congregational 'ist. 

It  is  inconceivable  that  any  man  of  integrity  and  honor 
who  really  believed  in  the  diving  of  Jesus  Christ,  as  ex- 
pressed by  the  homoousion  of  the  creed  of  Christendom, 
could  allow  one  who  denied  that  fundamental  verity  of 
fundamental  verities  to  receive  the  Holy  Communion  at 
his  hands.  This  is  what  the  Rector  of  Trinity  Church, 
Boston,  as  it  is  alleged,  habitually  did.  I  am  not  speak- 
ing of  administering  the  Blessed  Sacrament  to  one.  who 
unexpectedly  to  the  celebrant,  presents  himself  at  the  Lord's 
Table.  In  that  case,  charity  might  suggest  that  the  would 
be  recipient  had  abandoned  his  heresy  and  came  as  a  be- 
liever, however  unlikely  the  supposition  might  be,  but  I 
am  speaking  of  cases  where  the  parties  invited  were  known 
to  be  Unitarians,  and  were  asked  as  such  to  come  to  the 
Holy  Communion.  Consider  what  this  act  involves,  naught 
less  than  the  grossest  insult  to  the  majesty  of  the  Eternal 
Son  of  God.  Lower  your  thoughts  infinitely  from  God  to 
man  and  take  an  illustration  from  human  experience  of 
what  such  conduct  means  and  see  how  you  are  shocked. 
Suppose  the  guardians  of  an  earthly  king  or  queen  were  to 
admit  to  the  royal  drawing1  room  some  one  who  they 
knew  repudiated  the  character  of  the  sovereign,  and  re- 
garded the  highest  official  personage  in  the  state  as  a 
serf,  and  acted  accordingly  in  the  presence  of  majesty. 
How  distressing  such  an  exhibition  would  be.  In  the  cele- 
bration of  the  Holy  Eucharist,  on  any  view  of  the  Sacra- 
ment which  you  may  take,  allowable  in  the  range  of  Cath- 
olic thought,  you  are  in  the  presence  chamber  of  the  King 


11 

of  Kings,  and  He  scrutinizes,  not  alone  the  outward 
man  in  dress  and  demeanor,  but  the  secrets  of  the  heart, 
and  there  by  special  invitation  of  the  guardians  of  His 
honor  are  persons  present,  and  who  approach  His  throne, 
who  deny  His  incommunicable  glory  and  assert  that  He  is 
a  creature.  They  sink  Him  from  the  uncreated  essence  of 
deity  by  an  infinite  degradation  to  the  level  of  created  life. 
This  is  inconceivably  worse  than  to  allow  the  Queen  of 
Great  Britain  to  be  treated  as  a  char-woman,  or  the  Presi- 
of  the  United  States  as  a  day-laborer.  What  I  am  saying 
does  not  reflect  upon  the  Unitarians,  or  the  Arians,  since 
they  certainly  may  feel  themselves  justified  in  accepting  an 
invitation  when  it  is  extended  to  them.  The  fault  lies  at 
the  door  of  the  host,  not  with  those  who  come  at  his  bid- 
ding as  guests.  Nor  yet  am  I  reflecting  upon  the  host  in 
this  instance,  except  in  so  far  as  to  suggest  that  in  some 
unaccountable  way  he  has  been  all  along  and  is  still,  so 
far  as  I  know,  an  Arian  of  some  kind.  On  this  theory, 
and  it  seems  to  me  «on  no  other,  can  his  conduct  be  ex- 
plained. 

The  Church  has  from  the  first  guarded  the  Blessed  Eu- 
charist as  practically  the  citadel  of  the  Christian  faith,  and 
admission  to  Its  reception  ever  has  been  and  is  regarded 
as  the  certificate,  which  may  be  seen  and  read  of  all  men, 
of  orthodoxy.  The  Anglican  Communion  is  not  behind  the 
Church  Catholic  in  the  past,  and  of  the  present  elsewhere 
in  seeking  to  protect  the  Holy  Mysteries  from  the  intrusion 
of  persons,  who  do  not  acknowledge  the  faith  summed  up 
in  the  creeds.  The  whole  structure  of  the  Liturgy,  the 
rubrics,  and  the  canons,  and  above  all  the  recitation  of 


12 

the  creed  after  the  Gospel  place  a  bar,  which  it  would  seem 
no  honorable  or  responsible  man  who  denied  this  faith 
would  or  could  pass  and  present  himself  to  receive  at  the 
Lord's  Table.  When  I  find  therefore  that  a  Presbyter,  who 
has  conspicuously  on  a  great  occasion  invited  persons 
whose  public  recognition  is  that  of  Unitarian  ministers,  to 
receive  the  Holy  Communion  in  violation  of  the  laws  of 
the  Church,  and  the  essential  spirit  of  the  Liturgy,  when  I 
find  that  this  Presbyter  is  a  Bishop-elect,  and  is  in  prospect 
of  being  invested  with  the  Episcopal  office,  and  has  made 
no  retraction  or  explanation  of  such  conduct  and  of  num- 
erous other  acts  and  utterances  of  a  like  character,  setting 
at  defiance  the  authority  of  the  Church  as  expressed  in  her 
ordinal,  creeds,  offices,  articles,  rubrics,  and  canons,  then 
it  becomes  me,  as  one  having  the  fear  of  God  before  his 
eyes,  to  endeavor  as  far  as  in  me  lies,  to  guard  the  trust 
of  which  I  was  put  in  charge,  when  I  was  made  a  Bishop, 
and  to  seek  to  set  at  rest  all  doubts  and  misgivings  touch- 
ing this  Presbyter's  orthodoxy,  and  'loyalty  to  the  polity 
and  teaching  of  the  Church,  before  he  is  consecrated. 

This  I  strove  to  do  in  such  ways  as  seemed  to  me  avail- 
able for  the  purpose,  and  I  ceased  not  in  my  efforts  until 
the  act  of  consecration  was  performed.  What  has  intensified 
my  grief  and  distress  has  been  that  my  Rt.  Rev.  Brethren, 
who  gave  their  consent,  seemed  to  be  in  possession  of  most, 
if  not  all  of  the  facts,  as  they  were  known  to  me,  and  yet 
they  said,  "it  pleases  us  that  he  should  be  a  Bishop,"  nay 
some  of  them  like  yourself  seemed  to  be  eager  that  the 
Bishop-elect  should  be  confirmed  and  consecrated,  without 
one  word  of  explanation,  or  apology. 


13 

I  am  aware  of  the  delicacy  which  forbids  a  man  to  speak, 
while  his  case  is  still  undecided,  but  when  such  restraint  is 
removed  by  confirmation,  then  it  would  seem  that  he  ought, 
if  he  could  in  conscience  do  so,  to  relieve  the  painful  doubts 
and  anxieties,  which  he  himself  has  occasioned  to  thousands 
of  his  own  household  of  faith. 

I  sought  to  bring  this  about  by  appealing  to  the  Pre- 
siding Bishop  as  the  one,  who  could  with  the  most  propriety 
approach  the  Bishop-elect  and  confirmed,  and  afford  him 
an  opportunity  of  explaining  his  past  record,  or  of  giving 
promise  of  amendment  for  the  future.  So  far  as  I  know, 
the  Presiding  Bishop  did  not  see  his  way  clear  to  do  this, 
at  all  events  the  Bishop-elect  was  not  heard  from. 

It  is  easy  for  you  and  others  to  criticise  my  acts  in  this 
sad  business,  but  I  submit  that  they  were  all  honorable, 
and  such  as  any  one  who  believed  in  the  essential  divinity 
of  his  Saviour  would  take  when  he  had  good  reason  to  be 
convinced  that  a  man,  who  symbolized  with  Arius,  was  to 
be  admitted  to  the  Episcopate.  The  steps  which  I  took 
were  these: 

1st.  On  the  16th  of  May  I  addressed  a  circular  letter  to 
my  brother  Bishops,  urging  them  to  consider  what  consent 
would  imply  unless  some  explanation  were  given.  (See 
Appendix  1.)  • 

2d.  I  addressed  the  Bishop-elect  two  letters  explaining 
to  him  my  position  and  difficulties,  and  asking  him  to  re- 
lieve my  anxieties.  (See  Appendix  2.) 

3d.  I  addressed  the  Presiding  Bishop  after  confirmation 
was  secured,  and  received  no  reply.  (See  Appendix  3.) 


14 

4th.  I  sought  to  unite  those,  who  refused  consent,  in  a 
protest,  to  guard  as  far  as  possible  the  integrity  of  the 
Church,  when  she  was  receiving  such  a  cruel  blow,  as  it 
seemed  to  me,  from  her  chief  rulers — (Appendix  4) — and 

5th.  I  send  forth  this  letter  in  the  hope  that  it  will  help 
to  stay  the  downward  trend  of  faith  and  practice,  and  as 
far  as  possible  prevent  this  consecration  being  drawn  into 
a  precedent,  so  that  we  shall  not  presently  have  every 
possible  .heresy  represented  in  our  Episcopate. 

I  ought  to  say  here  that  I  have  been  embarrassed  in  my 
efforts  to  discharge  what  seemed  to  me  to  be  my  duty  to 
the  Church,  by  the  secrecy,  which  surrounds  the  voting  of 
the  Bishops.  I  could  not  learn  who  the  non-placets  were. 
The  information  was  refused  when  I  sought  it  that  I  might 
consult  with  them.  I  do  not  mean  to  imply  that  the  with- 
holding such  information  was  personal  to  myself,  it  was 
doubtless  in  accordance  with  the  present  system,  but  the 
present  system  is  vicious  in  many  of  its  details,  and  it 
ought  to  be  recast  and  reformed  throughout.  Leaving  out 
of  view  the  relation  of  standing  committees  to  Episcopal 
elections,  which  according  to  the  most  recent  interpreta- 
tion amounts  to  a  mere  shadow,  and  carries  with  it  little 
or  no  weight  or  value,  the  responsibility  of  confirming 
Bishops-elect  rests  where  it  belongs  with  the  Bishops  of  the 
Province,  that  is  in  our  case  with  the  Bishops  exercising 
jurisdiction  in  the  United  States.  We  ought  then  to  be  put 
in  a  position  by  provision  of  law,  where  we  could  intelli- 
gently and  rightly  meet  our  obligations,  and  discharge  our 
duty.  We  are  not,  however;  on  the  contrary  our  condition 
is  pitiable.  We  are  left  alone,  each  to  act  for  himself  as 


15 

best  he  may,  and  if  there  be,  as  the  occasion  which  draws 
forth  this  letter  shows  there  may  be,  cases  which  cause 
grave  doubts  as  to  the  fitness  of  the  Bishop-elect  for  con- 
secration, we  are  shut  out  from  all  means  of  allaying  our 
anxieties  and  removing  our  scruples,  and  onward  until  con- 
secration there  is  no  opportunity  afforded  for  applying 
any  test,  to  secure  the  Church  against  the  intrusion  of  men 
into  the  highest  office  of  her  ministry,  who  may  seem  to  be 
scarcely  apt  and  meet  for  such  exalted  station.  If  under 
such  circumstances  individual  Bishops  act  or  speak  under 
the  stress  of  conscience,  they  are  liable  to  be  misunder- 
stood, at  all  events  a  hostile  public  press  will  put  upon 
their  conduct  the  worst  possible  construction  and  hold 
them  up  to  ridicule  and  abuse.  Again,  the  mode  of  signi- 
fying assent  or  dissent  is  open  to  criticism.  A  limit  as  to 
time  should  be  set  as  to  the  period  within  which  votes 
must  be  given,  and  every  one  should  be  by  canonical  ob- 
ligation obliged  to  make  response  in  the  affirmative  or 
negative,  or  saying  unprepared  to  vote.  Then  until  all  the 
suffrages  have  been  received  the  utmost  secrecy  should 
be  observed,  and  when  the  result  is  reached,  then  the  se- 
crecy should  be  removed,  and  whoever  wishes  should  be 
allowed  to  know  how  the  vote  stood  and  who  the  ayes 
and  nays  and  neutrals  were. 

The  attempt  has  been  made  to  soften  the  present  case 
upon  which  I  am  commenting,  by  bringing  under  review 
two  instances  which  have  occurred  within  the  present  cen- 
tury in  our  Mother  Church  of  England — those,  namely,  of 
the  Bishop  of  Hereford,  in  1848,  and  of  the  Bishop  of 
Exeter,  in  1869— which  occasioned,  at  the  time  when  they  re- 


16 

spectively  occurred,  grave  apprehensions,  on  account  of  the 
alleged  heterodox  teaching  of  the  parties  nominated  by 
the  Crown  to  those  sees. 

In  the  first ,  place,  I  desire  to  draw  your  attention  to  the 
unusual  direction  which  your  inference  'takes  when  arguing 
about  the  things  of  God,  and  respectfully  inquire  whether 
it  would  take  the  same  direction  if  you  were  considering 
your  own  affairs?  The  argument  seems  to  be  this:  Per- 
sons, whose  past  career  has  awakened  grave  misgivings, 
have  been  admitted  to  the  Episcopate,  and  no  alleged 
positive  ill  results  have  followed  in  their  case ;  consequently 
we  may  infer  that  no  evil  will  be  produced  in  the  future  by 
continuing  to  allow  such  consecrations.  Suppose  there  were 
forced  into  your  schools  two  pupils  of  depraved  habits, 
and  it  so  happened  that  the  scholars,  so  far  as  you  knew, 
were  not  harmed,  would  you  recognize  that  as  a  reason 
for  continuing  to  run  the  risk  of  admitting  immoral  pupils 
in  the  future?  If  you  did,  I  fear  your  patrons  would  not 
agree  with  you,  and  your  schools  would  soon  be  empty. 

In  the  second  place,  the  Church  of  England  is  not  respon- 
sible, as  you  know  full  well,  for  the  choice  and  consecration 
of  her  Bishops,  as  we  are  in  this  country.  The  State,  it 
may  be  said,  controls  the  whole  business.  The  Crown 
nominates,  and  forces  its  nominee  upon  the  Church,  under 
the  threat,  if  the  Church  declines  to  receive  the  person 
named,  of  the  pains  and  penalties  of  prgemunire,  which 
amount  to  outlawry.  When  Bishop  Hampden  was  conse- 
crated, the  State  showed  her  teeth,  and  Dean  Meriweather 
and  even  Bishops  quailed.  Lord  John  Russell  showed  little 
courtesy  or  consideration  to  the  highest  dignitaries  of  the 


17 

Church  in  that  day.  The  Church  in  these  United  States 
labors  under  no  such  apprehensions,  and  consequently  she 
is  free  to  act,  and  her  responsibility  to  God  and  man  is. 
correspondingly  the  greater. 

Again,  the  cases  of  the  Bishops  of  Hereford  and  Exeter 
must  be  separated,  since  they  are  really  wide  apart.  Dr.. 
Hampden  was  censured  for  pravity  of  teaching,  but  it  was: 
urged  in  his  defense  that  he  was  by  nature  incapable  of 
recognizing  theological  distinctions ;  that,  as  in  the  field  of 
vision  there  are  persons  who  are  color-blind,  so,  in  the 
sphere  of  theology,  the  unfortunate  Begins  Professor  of 
Divinity  was  color-blind ;  he  could  not  tell  green  from 
red.  He  was  in  heresy,  but  he  did  not  know  it. 

Dr.  Temple,  once  Bishop  of  Exeter,  now  Bishop  of 
London,  was  never  censured  in  person.  The  utmost  that 
can  be  said  of  him  was,  that  he  was  in  questionable  com- 
pany. The  book  of  Essays  in  which  his  appeared,  was 
condemned.  Had  his  essay  been  separated  from  its  com- 
panions, no  fault  could  or  would  have  been  found  with 
it.  Leaving  out  of  view  differences  of  country  and  state 
control,  the  cases  of  Hereford  and  Exeter  do  not  approach 
a  parallel  with  the  case  of  Massachusetts. 

In  writing  as  I  do,  I  am  well  aware  of  my  present  dis- 
advantage as  compared  with  the  position  which  you  oc- 
cupy. I  must  appeal  simply  to  Churchmen — to  those  who 
accept  the  faith  and  polity  of  the  Church,  and  are  in  hearty 
sympathy  with  the  rubrics  and  canons  which  guard  the 
Catholic  Creed  and  Apostolic  Order.  Your  strength  lies  be- 
yond, in  the  great  multitude,  who  applaud  what  they  call 
—2 


18 

liberality,  and  who  imagine  that  truth  has  no  real  exist- 
ence beyond  a  man's  own  thoughts.  Your  constituency 
is  immense;  mine  is  small.  I  am  content.  I  pass  to  dis- 
cuss other  matters. 

There  are  times  which  "try  men's  souls."  Times  which, 
BO  to  speak,  turn  men  inside  out,  and  reveal  to  the  world 
of  what  stuff  they  are  made.  Often  the  disclosure,  when 
the  excitement  is  over  and  the  crisis  is  past,  astonishes  no 
one  more  than  the  very  men  who  have  exceeded,  or  disap- 
pointed expectations,  as  the  case  may  be.  Doubtless  the 
"wretched  Demas,  who  had  once  stood  manfully  for  the 
cause  of  Christ  in  the  face  of  danger,  was  amazed  at  him- 
•self  when,  confronted  by  the  prospect  of  the  Neronic  perse- 
cution, he  forsook  the  aged  Apostle  in  his  Koman  prison, 
having  loved  this  present  world  more  than  truth,  and 
honor,  and  duty.  Probably  the  blessed  evangelist,  St.  Luke, 
who  had  shared  with  Demas  the  holy  companionship  of  St. 
Paul,  was  equally  surprised  when  he  found  himself  the  sub- 
ject of  universal  commendation  for  his  patient  continuance 
in  well  doing.  One  event  had  happened  alike  to  both.  The 
one  quailed  and  fell;  the  other  went  right  on  as  he  had 
done  before.  The  crisis  tested  them,  and  we,  you  and  I 
and  all  men,  know  them  now  as  Demas  and  St.  Luke.  Their 
names  have  not  been  changed,  but  the  men  who  bear  those 
names  are  now  seen  through  them  as  they  really  are — the 
time-server  and  the  coward  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  stead- 
fast friend  and  hero  on  the  other. 

Ordinarily  men  are  not  tried  in  this  manner.  They  go 
on  the  even  tenor  of  their  way,  and  pass  out  of  this  world 
without  being  compelled  to  give  an  account  of  themselves 


19 

to  their  own  souls,  or  to  others  about  them.  That  ordeal 
awaits  them  when,  at  the  bar  of  final  judgment,  they  must 
come  forth  from  their  hiding  place,  and  each,  in  the  Apos- 
tle's language,  "give  account  of  himself  to  God."  Perhaps 
we  ought  to  be  thankful  when  the  heavens  gather  blackness 
over  our  heads,  and  we  find  ourselves  in  the  storm,  or  see 
that  it  will  very  soon  burst  upon  us,  because  such  expe- 
riences anticipate  the  judgment  day,  and  show  us  ourselves 
as  we  really  are.  The  disguise  is  stripped  off,  and  in  mercy 
we  are  compelled  to  see  ourselves  as  God  sees  us. 

Whether  it  be  for  our  own  advantage  or  not,  such  provi- 
dentially is  our  lot  to  find  ourselves,  at  the  close  of  this 
century,  in  times  which  subtly  test  men,  and  bring  their 
innermost  self  to  the  surface  and  display  it.  The  test  is 
not  applied,  as  in  the  age  of  Dem  as  and  St.  Luke,  with 
pain  and  suffering  and  death.  It  comes  now  in  another 
form,  rather  the  opposite.  The  devil  is  not  personified  in 
Nero,  but  comes  arrayed  as  an  angel  of  light.  He  is  a  liar 
still,  he  must  always  be,  but  his  lie  is  no  longer  black  with 
the  horrid  immorality  portrayed  by  St.  Paul  in  his  Epistle 
to  the  Romans,  and  exhibited  as  the  staple  of  every-day 
life  in  that  old  heathen  world.  Satan  has  now  insinuated 
himself  into  the  very  strongholds  of  Christianity,  and 
sought  to  enter  into  a  truce  with  its  leaders  and  militant 
hosts.  He  reaches  or  rather  overreaches  multitudes  of 
excellent  and  deeply  religious  people  through  a  vain  phi- 
losophy, which  allies  itself  with  the  Gospel,  and  seduces 
men  into  accepting  its  sophistry,  by  professing  the  pro- 
foundest  love  for  the  Saviour,  while  it  robs  Him  of  His 
glory;  the  deepest  reverence  for  the  dogmatic  faith,  while 


20 

it  divests  it  of  its  truth;  and  the  greatest  respect  for  its 
official  ministry,  while  it  denies  the  grace  of  orders. 

Its  method  is  not  altogether  new;  it  was  employed  with 
success  in  Athens,  in  the  days  of  Socrates.  He  unsparingly 
exposed  it,  and  scourged  it  in  his  encounters  with  the 
Sophists.  It  has  always  been  in  the  world  since  it  played 
fast  and  loose  with  words  in  the  Garden  of  Eden,  and 
whispered,  as  it  impiously  and  blasphemously  gave  God 
the  lie,  ''Ye  shall  not  surely  die."  It  always  has  been  in  the 
world,  and  doubtless  always  will  be,  but  now  it  strengthens 
itself  in  a  condition  of  things  which  has  never  existed  be- 
fore, and  takes  advantage  of  weapons  forged  for  a  very 
different  purpose,  which  are  ready  for  use  and  near  at  hand. 

The  conditions  of  life  are  so  improved  that  the  world 
has  improved  with  age,  and  men  like  it  better  than  they 
did.  Mammon  is  a  mightier  god  than  ever  he  was  before. 
His  worship  invites  conclusions,  which  men  are  only  too 
ready  and  eager  to  adopt— such  as  the  unreality  of  sin,  the 
uselessness  of  sacrifice,  the  aimless  love  of  God,  saving  all 
irrespective  of  spiritual  condition,  without  penitence  and 
without  faith. 

It  would  have  been  difficult  for  this  Epicurean  philosophy 
to  intrude  itself  into  any  system,  which  professedly  rested 
upon  the  Gospel  of  Jesus  Christ,  much  less  into  the  bosom 
of  the  Catholic  Church,  had  a  way  not  been  prepared  for 
its  admission,  and  weapons  contrived  for  its  defence  cen- 
turies ago,  when  Calvinism  found  lodgment  in  the  minds 
and  hearts  of  multitudes  in  the  West,  and  imposed  its 
blighting  influence  upon  the  Church  itself  and  the  Word  of 
God.  The  formulated  principles  of  Calvinism,  as  laid  down 


21 

with  consummate  ability  by  its  author,  are  absolutely 
and  manifestly  irreconcilable  with  Holy  Scripture,  and 
the  dogmatic  teaching  of  historic  Christianity.  To  over- 
come this  apparently  insuperable  obstacle  to  the  entrance, 
and  more,  the  acceptance  of  "the  five  points,"  as  they 
were  called,  of  this  system  in  the  region  of  thought  and 
belief,  which  claimed  Christ  as  their  author,  a  contrivance 
was  resorted  to,  which  served  for  the  time  very  satisfac- 
torily, but  which,  like  all  dishonest  and  immoral  methods 
has  wrought  and  is  working  incalculable  mischief.  It  was 
not,  of  course,  the  intention  of  those  who  had  recourse  to 
this  clever  device  to  do  harm.  They  thought  that  they 
were  doing  God  service  in  making  it  possible  for  the 
cherished  teaching  of  their  master  to  be  reconciled,  as  they 
fondly  persuaded  themselves  it  was,  by  what  they  called 
-"interpretation,"  to  the  Gospel  of  Jesus  Christ. 

With  this  machinery,  for  with  the  elder  Calvinists  "inter- 
pretation" covered  a  great  deal  of  ground,  they  achieved 
success.  Interpretation  included  exegesis,  exposition,  ap- 
plication, parallelism,  correllation  of  texts,  and  sometimes, 
when  naught  else  would  do,  the  absolute  rejection  of  the 
written  word,  calling  it  as  did  Luther  the  Epistle  of  St. 
James,  "a  scripture  of  straw."  This  ingenious  machinery 
enabled  these  magicians  to  accomplish  wonders  with  the 
Bible,  the  Creed  and  the  Church.  The  language  remained 
the  same,  but  if;  was  fluxed  with  new  meanings,  draped 
with  new  expositions,  explained  away  with  brand  new  hy- 
potheses, which  they  called  without  appreciating  in  the 
remotest  degree  the  irony  of  the  expression,  "charitable." 
A  single  illustration  will  serve  to  make  plain  my  meaning, 


22 

and  I  choose  it  the  rather,  because  it  shows  how  much 
mischief  is  caused  by  tampering  with  truth.  One  of  the 
chief  tenets  of  Calvinism  is  the  indefectibility  of  grace,  that 
is  that  grace  once  received  cannot  be  forfeited,  it  must  ac- 
complish its  purpose  and  bring  its  subject,  the  one  who 
has  received  it,  to  salvation  in  heaven.  The  baptismal 
office  of  the  Church  asserts  of  every  one  baptized  that  "he 
is  regenerate,"  or  born  again,  but  the  theory  of  John  Cal- 
vin compels  this  language  to  mean,  that  every  such  per- 
son pronounced  regenerate  is  absolutely  and  uncondition- 
ally sure  of  ultimate  salvation.  We  know,  however,  by  sad 
experience  that  many  who  are  baptized  lead  bad  lives  and 
die  impenitent,  and  consequently  it  is  abhorrent  to  reason, 
and  the  moral  sense  to  teach  that  such  reprobates  will  be 
saved.  What  then?  Must  Jesus  Christ  and  his  Church  give 
way,  or  John  Calvin?  They  are  manifestly  brought 
into  direct  conflict,  since  our  Blessed  Lord  clearly  teaches 
that  baptism  and  the  gift  of  regeneration  are  united,  and 
the  Church  applies  His  teaching  in  her  office,  "Except  a 
man  be  born  of  water  and  of  the  Spirit  he  cannot  enter  into 
the  Kingdom  of  God,"  are  Christ's  express  words,  and 
another  injunction  of  His  is,  "What  God  hath  joined  to- 
gether let  not  man  put  asunder."  Accordingly  Christ's 
body,  the  Church,  speaking  in  His  Name,  says  of  every  one 
who  is  baptized,  "Seeing  now  dearly  beloved  brethren  that 
this  person  is  regenerate."  And  John  Calvin  rejoins,  "it  is 
not  certain,  far  from  it;  it  is  very  doubtful."  How  then 
is  such  a  colossal  difficulty  to  be  surmounted?  By  the 
theory  of  a  "charitable  hypothesis,"  which  is  another 
name  for  "interpretation,"  by  fluxing  the  words  of  the 


23 

baptismal  office,  which  are  positive,  and  assert  without 
qualification  a  thing  as  being  so,  as  being  true,  by  fluxing 
them  with  a  new  meaning,  so  that  they  are  to  be  under- 
stood in  a  new  sense.  The  Church  says,  "is  regenerate," 
but  the  Church  does  not  know  how  to  express  herself.  She 
means,  says  Calvinism,  that  "the  person  may  charitably  be 
supposed  to  be  regenerate,  but  it  is  by  no  means  certain." 
That  is  to  say,  Holy  Church,  our  Mother,  meets  us  at  the 
font  with  a  lie,  or  a  quasi  lie.  She  assures  us  of  what  she 
is  not  sure.  She  tells  us  positively  and  without  any  qualifi- 
cation that  a  thing  is  true,  which  she  does  not  know  to  be 
true — nay,  which,  if  she  is  as  wise  as  was  John  Calvin,  she 
has  grave  reasons  for  believing  is  more  likely  to  be  false 
than  true.  This  is  a  specimen  of  what  is  called  "interpreta- 
tion" as  employed  in  times  before  our  day,  and  inherited  by 
us  with  all  its  baleful  effects  of  disloyalty  to  truth,  laxity 
of  belief,  evasion  and  conjuring  with  words.  No  wonder  a 
schism  resulted  as  a  protest  against  being  obliged,  by 
ordination  vows,  to  utter  in  the  name  of  God,  as  truth, 
what  at  best  was  not,  as  they  were  taught  and  believed, 
certainly  true.  One  feels  a  pity  for  such  persons,  and,  to  a 
certain  extent,  a  sympathy  for  them,  since  if  we  were  labor- 
ing under  the  misapprehension  which  seemed  to  be  their 
fatality,  we  certainly  could  not  have  repeated  those  words 
as  they  stand  in  the  office.  At  all  events,  these  persons 
ought  to  be  given  credit  for  honesty  and  honor.  When 
they  found  themselves  unable  to  accept  wha,t  they,  under 
misconception,  supposed  to  be  the  teaching  of  the  Church, 
they  left  the  Church.  They  did  not  remain  and  strive,  by 
evasion  and  trickery  and  disloyalty,  to  reform  the  Church, 


24 

or  flux  the  Church  with  their  individualisms  as  new  mean- 
ings, which  would  lift  the  Church  to  the  level,  as  they 
express  it,  of  the  age,  lyy  which  they  mean,  in  their  un- 
bounded self-conceit,  their  own  level. 

The  misconception  of  these  misguided  men  arose  from  the 
new  meaning  or  interpretation  which  Calvinism  had  put 
into  the  word  ''regeneration."  In  the  Catholic  sense,  it 
means  the  second  or  new  birth, — it  is  an  event,  a  fact,  as 
was  the  first  birth.  It  introduces  its  subject  into  a  new 
condition  or  state,  with  possibilities  unnumbered  and  un- 
limited. It  runs  a  parallel,  therefore,  with  our  natural 

birth,  as  our  Lord  clearly  teaches,  by  using  the  language 

> 

which  He  employs.  Natural  birth  is  a  fact,  an  event;  the 
child  is  born  once  for  all.  It  may  be  a  misshapen  mon- 
ster, it  may  come  into  the  world  with  inherited  disease,  it 
may  die  as  soon  as  it  is  born,  or  it  may  live  and  be  a 
curse  upon  the  earth — nevertheless  it  is  born,  and  the  mid- 
wife is  entitled  to  say,  "this  child  is  born,  and  it  comes 
into  this  world  as  the  gift  of  God,"  just  as  truly  as  when 
it  is  perfect  in  limb  and  form,  and  developes  into  a  saint. 
After  the  same  manner  the  second  or  spiritual  birth  is  a 
fact,  an  event;  it  occurs  once  for  all.  The  divine  instru- 
ment of  this  birth  is  the  Holy  Ghost,  but  the  Holy  Ghost 
is  not  the  gift  of  baptism.  He,  the  Blessed  Spirit,  is  the 
gift  of  the  laying  on  of  hands  in  Confirmation.  Whether 
the  subject  of  the  second  birth  comes  qualified  or  not,  when 
he  is  baptized  the  Church,  like  the  midwife,  proclaims  a  fact, 
and  says,  "this  person  is  regenerate."  No  worse  case  could 
occur,  it  is  difficult  to  believe,  than  that  of  Simon  Magus, 
who  meets  us  on  the  threshold  of  Christianity,  and  yet  after 


25 

his  baptism,  although  St.  Peter  tells  him  that  he  is  still 
"in  the  gall  of  bitterness  and  the  bond  of  iniquity,"  he 
does  not  bid  him  be  baptized  again,  any  more  than  he 
counsels  him  to  enter  a  second  time  into  his  mother's 
womb  and  be  born,  but  he  exhorts  him  to  repent.  Had 
Simon  repented  at  the  preaching  of  St.  Peter,  and  not  gone 
on  still  in  his  wickedness,  he  would  have  made  the  possi- 
bilities of  the  spiritual  life  his  glorious  possession  and  have 
been  saved.  If  then  it  was  true  of  Simon  Magus,  when  he 
was  baptized  that  he  was  regenerate,  it  is  equally  true  of 
every  one.  But  Calvin  fluxed  regeneration  with  the  logical 
consequences  of  his  own  original  system,  and  hence  he  over- 
flowed the  word  with  renovation,  sanctification  and  salva- 
tion, and  of  course  with  such  an  interpretation  it  would 
not  be  certainly  true  that  the  subject  of  Baptism  was  re- 
generate, any  more  than  it  would  be  true  to  assert,  that 
because  a  child  was  born  into  this  world  it  would  be  a 
great  and  good  man. 

But  the  misery  of  this  immoral  treatment  of  Holy  Scrip- 
ture, and  the  teaching  of  Holy  Church,  of  making  the  Word 
of  God  of  none  effect  by  human  inventions  and  interpreta- 
tions, which  is  a  trifle  worse  than  by  traditions,  the  misery 
is  that  it  has  borne  its  bitter  and  pernicious  fruit,  and 
taught  succeeding  generations  to  go  forward  on  the  lines  of 
their  ancestors,  and  as  they  would  say,  improve  upon 
their  methods.  Now  we  have  men  who  lay  claim  to  the 
highest  positions  in  the  Church,  who  unblushingly  contemn 
her  orders,  compromise  her  deposit  of  faith  by  word  and 
deed,  break  with  the  fellowship  of  the  Apostles,  which  was 
one  of  the  criteria  of  the  first  believers,  and  rejoice  in  the 


26 

V 

companionship  of  a  great  multitude,  who  have  only  one 
thing  in  common,  that  they  disown  the  Catholic  heritage 
as  it  comes  to  us  from  the  past,  held  and  administered  by 
a  living  Episcopate,  and  enshrined  in  creed  and  office  and 
ordinal.  The  one  word  these  men  use  in  their  defense  is, 
"interpretation."  It  is  the  old  word,  the  charitable  hypo- 
thesis idea  made  to  do  new  service  in  undermining  the  Word 
of  God,  traversing  the  creed  with  strange  and  false  mean- 
ings, breaking  down  the  bulwarks  of  the  Church  in  sacred 
office,  in  rubrical  and  canonical  law,  reducing  her,  the  vine- 
yard of  the  Lord,  to  a  wretched  common.  With  their  "in- 
terpretation," as  they  call  it,  they  assail  the  fundamental 
verities  of  the  faith  in  a  multitude  of  words,  which,  like 
the  haze  which  envelopes  the  mountains,  half  conceals  their 
destructive  and  deadly  purpose.  Under  this  process  of 
criticism  the  doctrine  of  the  Blessed  Trinity,  the  homoou- 
sion  of  the  Eternal  Son  with  the  Father,  His  supernatural 
birth  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  the  atonement  made  by  the  shed- 
ding of  the  precious  Blood,  the  resurrection  of  the  body, 
the  ministries  of  the  Holy  Ghost  in  the  three  sacred  orders, 
and  in  the  sacraments  and  means  of  grace,  all  are  evaporated 
into  refinements,  which  mean  nothing,  and  Christianity  is 
reduced  to  a  bare  hiimanitarianism,  a  system  to  promote 
good  living  here  on  earth  and  ameliorate  the  woes  and  ills 
to  which  flesh  is  heir.  Press  such  men  with  the  venerable 
truths,  as  they  stand  in  the  creed  and  liturgy  of  the  ages, 
and  the  proof  texts  of  the  old  Bible,  and  they  will  lift  their 
eyebrows  with  supercilious  scorn,  and  tell  you  the  new  in- 
terpretations of  the  scholars  of  to-day,  the  theologians 


27 

who  get  their  inspiration  from  infidels  and  agnostics,  scat- 
ter all  such  rubbish  to  the  winds. 

The  wonder  grows  upon  us  how  people  of  good  sense  and 
honesty  of  purpose  can  be  imposed  upon  by  such  transpar- 
ent sophistry.  Take  these  men,  who  are  playing  fast  and 
loose  with  truth  in  the  domain  of  theology,  into  any  other 
sphere  of  life,  and  let  them  there  exhibit  their  ingenuity  at 
their  game  of  interpretation,  and  they  will  very  speedily 
come  to  grief.  Let  them  try  the  experiment,  say  in  the 
matter  of  contracts  or  finance,  and  the  patience  of  their 
fellow-men  would  soon  be  exhausted  in  dealing  with  such 
triflers,  and  they  would  justly  stand,  ere  long,  to  plead  to 
indictments  laid  against  them  for  fraud — nay,  they  might 
be  convicted  and  placed  as  felons  behind  prison  bars. 

I  am  quite  well  aware  that  there  are  cases,  and  very 
many,  where  there  is  room  for  varieties  of  interpretation, 
bnt  I  am  also  equally  well  aware  that  those  cases  never 
include,  for  Churchmen,  "the  closed  questions"  of  revela- 
tion and  the  Apostles'  and  Nicene  Creeds.  (See  Appendix  9.) 
Christ  made  no  provision,  in  His  charter  of  government, 
for  amendment  or  repeal  at  the  pleasure  of  mankind.  His 
injunction  to  the  Apostles  is  to  teach  on  His  authority 
whatsoever  He  had  commanded  them,  and  the  limits  and 
metes  and  bounds  of  this  imposed  faith  were  fixed  by  those 
to  whom  he  gave  the  pledge  and  promise  that  the  Holy  Ghost 
would  bring  all  things  which  He  had  told  them  to  their  re- 
membrance, and  would  guide  them  into  all  truth.  The  funda- 
mental principles  of  the  polity,  faith,  sacraments  and 
worship  of  .the  Church  were  settled  forever  by  these  in- 
spired men  before  they  were  taken  out  of  this  world.  Hence 


28 

it  could  be  said,  and  is  said  by  the  Word  of  God,  that  the 
first  believers  "continued  steadfastty  in  the  Apostles'  doc- 
trine, and  fellowship,  and  in  the  breaking  of  bread,  and  in 
prayers."  Essentially  these  things  have  never  been  changed 
from  that  day  to  this,  and  it  is  our  great  privilege  and 
honor  to  hold  them  as  a  sacred  trust  for  ourselves  and  all 
men,  if  they  will  share  with  us  in  the  divine  legacy,  and  to 
be  permitted,  if  we  show  ourselves  worthy,  to  transmit 
them  inviolate  to  those  who  are  to  come  after  us.  If  the 
form  of  sound  words  which  St.  Paul  bade  St.  Timothy 
"hold  fast,"  has  received  any  additions  since  his  day,  it 
has  not  been  in  the  way  of  enlarging  the  body  of  revealed 
truth,  that  can  only  be  done  by  Him.  Who  originally  re- 
vealed the  truth,  but  it  has  been  with  a  view  to  define  the 
truth,  already  held  in  possession  as  a  trust,  against  new 
interpretations  (that  is  the  word),  which  were  calculated 
to  undermine  and  destroy  the  truth.  The  Creed  is  no  larger 
now,  as  regards  the  area  of  truth  which  it  covers,  than  it 
was  when  St.  Paul  quoted  three  of  its  articles  in  writing  to 
the  Church  of  Corinth:  "I  delivered  unto  you  first  of  all," 
he  says,  "that  which  I  also  received,  how  that  Christ  died 
for  our  sins  according  to  the  Scriptures,  and  that  He  was 
buried,  and  that  He  rose  again  the  third  day  according  to 
the  Scriptures."  (1  Corinth,  xv.  3,  4.)  As  St.  Paul  received 
it,  so  we  have  received  it.  It  is  no  more  ours  than  it  was 
his ;  it  is  a  precious,  sacred  deposit  placed  in  our  hands  as 
a  trust,  and  we  are  forbidden  to  tamper  with  it  ourselves, 
or  allow  others  to  tamper  with  it. 

It  was  one  of  the  purposes  of  the  Blessed  Master  in  vest- 
ing the  polity  of  His  Church  in  a  corporation,  the  aposto- 


29 

late,  that  it  should  guard  His  truth  and  carry  it  to  the 
ends  of  the  earth,  and  preserve  it  inviolate  for  all  time. 
"Ye  shall  be  witnesses  unto  Me,"  our  Lord  says  to  His 
Apostles,  "both  in  Jerusalem  and  in  all  Judaea,  and  in 
Samaria  and  unto  the  uttermost  part  of  the  earth."  He  made 
them  partners  in  a  joint  trust,  and  committed  unto  them 
heavenly  treasures,  precious  beyond  measure,  the  gift  of 
orders,  the  offices  which  represent  Him,  the  faith  once 
for  all  delivered  unto  the  saints,  the  sacraments,  the  offi- 
cial channels  of  His  grace  and  divine  worship,  arranged  in 
accordance  with  the  analogy  of  faith.  This  sacred  deposit 
is  to  be  guarded  and  handed  on  and  down  from  generation 
to  generation  and  age  to  age,  and  security  taken  for  its 
safe  transmission.  As  the  Church  grew  and  spread,  and 
Bishops  were  multiplied,  the  aggregate  of  witnesses  who 
had  gone  up  higher,  added  to  those  who  remained 
on  earth,  became  a  majority  so  vast  and  so  constantly 
increasing,  that  the  voice  of  the  collective  Episcopate,  de- 
parted and  living,  could  not  be  overcome  by  the  defection 
of  one  or  two  or  ten  or  a  hundred,  who  might  drift  into 
heresy  and  make  shipwreck  of  their  faith.  They  could  not 
carry  the  Church,  as  a  whole,  with  them  into  unbelief  and 
schism,  but  they  might  compromise  the  Church  in  any  one 
land  and  break  with  the  mighty  past  and  their  brethren 
of  the  present.  This  unhappily  has  occurred  and  it  may 
happen  again.  '"Let  him  that  thinketh  he  standeth  take 
heed  lest  he  fall."  "He  that  hath  an  ear  let  him  hear  what 
the  Spirit  saith  unto  the  Churches." 

Recognizing  the  fact  then  that  the  Episcopate  is  put  in 
charge  of  the  Gospel  (St.  Paul  calls  the  faith  "the  Gospel"), 


80 

and  recognizing  the  further  fact  that  the  faith  is  now  as- 
sailed by  a  host  of  men,  not  only  without  the  Church,  but 
also  within,  who  profess  to  hold  the  truth  while  they  make 
it  void  by  their  interpretations,  it  becomes  my  duty  to 
give  account  of  myself  to  the  Church,  that  I  may  not  be 
thought  remiss  in  those  things  which  concern  the  whole 
body  of  the  faithful,  when  the  safety  of  the  sacred  deposit 
is  threatened,  and  our  claim  as  a  branch  of  Christ's  Church 
is  weakened  by  an  apparent  condoning  of  disloyalty  in  con- 
duct and  error  in  teaching,  which  is  profoundly  distressing. 
I  am  speaking  of  what  passes  beyond  the  limits  of 
party  lines.  The  distinction  is  almost  too  obvious  to  be 
dwelt  upon  at  length,  but  inasmuch  as  confusion  exists  on 
this  point  in  certain  quarters,  and  the  charge  has  been 
made  of  partisanship,  it  is  worth  while  to  remark  that 
principles  are  one  thing,  and  the  application  of  those  princi- 
ples is  quite  another.  Men  may  differ  and  do  differ  as  to 
the  best  method  of  administering  government,  and  in  con- 
sequence separate  into  parties,  and  in  the  heat  of  contro- 
versy, in  debate,  and  in  legislation,  and  in  the  conduct  of 
affairs  exhibit,  and  may  be  justly  charged  with  the  offense 
of  exhibiting  partisanship,  but  when  the  government  itself 
is  assailed,  when  the  fundamental  principles  of  the  consti- 
tution are  contemned  and  repudiated,  then  resistence  to 
such  ruinous  assaults  is  not  partisanship,  it  is  in  the  political 
world,  patriotism,  in  the  sphere  of  religion,  loyalty  to  truth 
and  duty.  When  a  man  fires  upon  the  flag  of  my  country, 
if  I  were  a  layman  I  would  be  prepared  to  fight ;  when  a  man 
flatly  contradicts  the  Blessed  Lord  Himself,  and  the  teach- 
ing of  the  Prayer  Book  throughout  its  length  and  breadth, 


31 

then  as  a  Bishop  in  the  Church  of  God  I  will  resist  as  far 
as  I  can,  and  by  every  method  which  I  can  legitimately 
emplo3T,  strive  to  prevent  the  intrusion  of  such  a  person 
into  a  share  of  the  custody  of  treasures,  which  he  has  held 
so  cheap,  that  he  counted  them  of  no  worth,  and  which,  as 
worthless  in  his  eyes,  he  wished  to  scatter  to  the  winds, 
and  if  I  fail  in  my  efforts  to  protect  the  Church  from  such  a 
disastrous  compromise,  of  what  seems  to  me  to  be  her  safety 
and  honor,  then,  while  I  must  perforce  submit  to  the  blow- 
inflicted  upon  our  communion,  I  will  still  do  my  best  to 
break,  as  far  as  possible,  its  force.  This  is  not  partisanship, 
it  has  no  relation  to  any  party  or  school  in  the  Church,  it 
goes  beyond  all  questions  which  separate  men  into  high  or 
low,  or  broad  or  narrow;  it  reaches  down  to  the  founda- 
tion, to  the  corner  stone,  to  Christ. 

Leaving  then  the  charge  of  partisanship,  which,  like  all 
personalities  in  a  crisis  like  the  present,  sinks  into  insignifi- 
cance, let  us,  my  Brother,  confront  our  duty  as  holding  a 
trusteeship  under  Christ,  of  treasures  of  infinite  worth, 
which  He  has  placed  in  our  hands,  and  ask  ourselves  the 
question,  what  principles  ought  to  'guide  us  in  the  admin- 
istration of  our  stewardship? 

We  may  safely  say,  and  we  think  all  right-minded  people 
will  agree  with  us,  that  we  ought  to  be  as  jealous  of  our 
spiritual  trusts  as  we  would  be  of  any  mere  earthly  treas- 
ure committed  to  our  custody,  as,  for  example,  money  or 
children.  It  is  not  difficult  to  discover  the  way  in  which  men 
view  their  duty  in  the  care  of  their  wealth  or  offspring. 
They  see  to  it,  as  far  as  they  can,  when  they  are  about  to 
make  a  loan  or  contract  a  daughter  in  marriage,  that  the 


32 

borrower  or  their  prospective  son-in-law  is  worthy.  If  there 
comes  to  their  ears  the  faintest  rumor  that  the  one  who  is 
on  the  eve  of  taking  their  ten  thousand  dollars  or  fondly 
loved  child  is  tarnished  in  reputation,  to  whom  do  they 
2^ve  the  benefit  of  their  doubt,  to  the  petitioner  for  the 
gold  or  the  wife,  or  to  their  money  or  the  sunshine  of  their 
home?  The  question  answers  itself.  The  financier  responds, 
"not  one  dollar  goes  out  of  my  hands  until  I  am  satisfied 
that  he  who  seeks  it  is  above  suspicion."  The  father  re- 
plies, "I  would  sooner  die  than  surrender  my  darling  to  one 
of  whose  honor  I  am  not  perfectly  sure."  The  man  who 
seeks  a  loan  or  a  wife  is  not  claiming  a  right,  he  is  asking 
a  favor,  and  hence  it  is  for  him  to  make  good  his  cause 
by  establishing  his  integrity.  It  is  the  unquestionable  duty 
of  the  banker  or  the  parent  to  look  well  to  it  that  there 
is  no  ground  for  distrust,  before  they  part  with  their  treas- 
ures. To  act  upon  any  other  principle,  would  be  a  criminal 
neglect  or  shirking  of  responsibility. 

When  we  pass  from  human  trusts  to  divine,  from  ordi- 
nary business  men  of  the  world  to  Bishops  in  the  Church 
of  God,  what  principles  shall  govern  them  in  the  adminis- 
tration of  their  stewardship?  Shall  they  reverse  the  axioms 
of  prudence,  which  guard  the  safety  of  earthly  possessions 
and  material  interests,  and  give  the  benefit  of  the  doubt, 
when  grave  suspicion  is  aroused  and  widely  prevails,  to  the 
candidate  pressed  upon  them  for  admission  to  their  order, 
to  share  in  the  guardianship  of  their  heavenly  inheritance, 
and  the  responsibility  of  transmitting  it  unimpaired  to  their 
successors?  Shall  they  say,  in  a  careless,  good-natured 
way,  "it  is  true  this  man  has  been  erratic  in  conduct  and 


33 

heretical  in  speech,  but  the  Episcopal  office  will  improve^ 
him;  it  has  done  so  before;  let  us  give  him  the  benefit  of 
the  doubt  and  make  him  a  Bishop''?  One  would  antece- 
dently suppose  that  it  would  be  impossible  that  any  man, 
who  was  conscious  that  he  was  a  trustee  for  God,  and  was 
living  and  acting  under  the  restraint  of  an  oath  of  fealty, 
could  utter  §uch  sentiments,  and  carry  them  out  in  the  act. 
Let  us  leave  the  matter  there.  It  is  better  that  we  should. 

The  tremendous  responsibility,  my  Brother,  of  our  stew- 
ardship over  and  above  the  priceless  value  of  the  treasures 
which  it  guards,  is  increased,  if  it  be  possible,  by  the  con- 
sideration that  our  conduct  helps  to  make  a  precedent  in 
the  direction  of  laxity  and  demoralization  and  ruin.  If  the 
benefit  of  the  doubt  is  given  not  to  God's  herit- 
age, but  to  the  man  who  knocks  at  the  door  and  asks  to 
share  in  the  administration  of  that  heritage  which  he  has 
hitherto  treated  with  habitual  disrespect,  then  his  conse- 
cration adds  another  illustration  to  strengthen  the  position 
of  those  who  deal  with  God's  trusts  as  they  certainly  never 
would  with  their  own  worldly  affairs. 

And  still  another  kind  of  precedent  is  supplied  by  this 
reversal  of  the  fundamental  principles  which  govern  men  in 
caring  for  their  own  personal  interests.  Whatever  defect 
in  belief  or  idiosyncrasy  of  conduct  may  belong  to  a 
man  who  becomes  a  Bishop,  it  is  claimed  by  those  who 
are  high  in  authority,  that  henceforth  those  negations  of 
faith  and  eccentricities  of  behaviour  cannot  be  urged  in 
future  as  bars  against  admission  to  the  Episcopate.  In 
the  face  of  such  an  allegation,  how  awful  becomes  the  re- 
—3 


34 

sponsibility  of  consenting  .to  the  consecration  of  one,  who 
not  in  a  private  way,  but  openly  .and  defiantly  and  repeat- 
edly, through  long  years  of  ministration,  is  reputed  to  have 
treated  with  little  consideration  the  law  of  the  universal 
Church,  the  rubrics  of  our  Prayer  Book,  and  the  Ordinal, 
which  protects  while  it  confers  the  three-fold  ministry, 
without  one  word  of  explanation  or  apology.  Henceforth, 
then,  no  one  can  be  refused  who  stands  upon  this  level, 
and  so  the  descent  is  easy,  lower  and  lower. 

The  argument,  of  course,  is  fallacious.  Thrown  into  a 
syllogism,  it  stands  as  follows,  and  its  weakness  at  once 
^appears. 

Whatever  a  man  admitted  to  the  Episcopate  believes,  or 
'does;  or  does  not  believe,  or  refuses  to  do,  henceforth  be- 
comes a  standard,  and  no  one  afterwards  can  be  rejected 
who  occupies  the  same  position.  This  is  the  major  premise. 
Now  let  us  pass  to  the  minor,  and  draw  the  conclusion. 
Certain  Bishops,  it  is  said,  in  England  and  in  this  country, 
have  denied  the  necessity  of  Episcopal  ordination  or  con- 
secration as  a  qualification  to  minister  the  sacraments; 
consequently  these  Bishops  have  virtually  repealed  the 
Ordinal,  for  the  weakest  link  measures  the  strength  of  the 
chain,  and  when  all  the  Bishops  on  the  bench  hold  the  same 
view  of  the  sacred  ministry,  and  they  may,  then  the  Ordi- 
nal, with  its  preface,  and  the  canons  which  guard  it  and 
give  practical  effect  to  it,  would  not  remain  one  moment 
longer  than  it  would  be  possible  to  repeal  them  and  get 
rid  of  them.  And,  indeed,  on  the  theory  that  Episco- 
pacy is  not  of  divine  origin,  and  imposed  by  God 
upon  the  Church  as  His  polity  for  its  government, 


35 

this  would  be  what  ought  to  be  done,  since  in  that  view 
of  the  subject  it  is  an  intolerable  impertinence  to  shut  men 
out  from  our  altars  who  have  as  valid  a  claim  to 
represent  Christ  as  we  have.  Could  I  be  persuaded  that  the 
Ordinal  does  not  mean  what  it  says,  that  Episcopacy  is  not 
rooted  in  the  charter  of  government  given  by  Christ  to  His 
Apostles  (St.  Matt.  XXVIII,  18,  etc  ),andby  them  developed 
as  He  had  prescribed,  I  would  not,  for  I  could  not,  remain  in 
a  system  which,  resting  simply  on  human  foundations,  no 
matter  how  ancient  they  were,  refused  to  recognize  as  min- 
isters of  Christ  our  brethren,  who  had  as  good  a  warrant 
for  what  they  presumed  to  do  as  we  could  produce. 

But  to  return  to  our  syllogism  and  the  consequences  of 
recent  action,  which  stare  us  in  the  face  and  confront  our 
communion.  It  is  not  a  matter  of  private  opinion,  which 
a  man  may  Lold  and  teach  as  hie  view,  but  it  is  an  issue 
forced  upon  our  attention  by  the  public  press  representing 
not  only  religion,  but  secularity,  sectarianism,  and,  worse, 
infidelity,  so  that  the  consent  to  admission,  as  the  outside 
world  distinctly  claims,  carries  with  it  the  necessity  of  ac- 
knowledging the  faith  once  delivered  unto  the  saints  to  be 
a  matter  indifferent,  and  the  Ordinal,  with  its  preface  and 
its  provisions  for  making  Bishops,  Priests  and  Deacons,  to 
be  useless,  and  indeed  worse,  an  impertinence.  The  argu- 
ment, then,  of  these  excellent  men  brings  us  to  these  con- 
clusions. Certain  Bishops  in  the  past,  as  holding  lax  views 
on  the  subject  of  Episcopacy,  repealed  the  Ordinal,  and 
now,  much  more,  one  who  has  made  himself  publicly  con- 
spicuous for  discrediting  the  only  purpose  which  the  Ordi- 


36 

rial  can  serve,  and  in  addition  has,  by  word  and  deed, 
discounted  the  fundamental  verities  of  the  blessed  Gospel, 
has  repealed  the  Apostles'  and  the  Nicene  Creeds. 

Henceforth  no  man  can  be  refused  the  Episcopate  who 
treats  the  doctrine  of  the  Blessed  Trinity  as  a  matter  of  no 
consequence,  since,  it  can  be  urged,  one  has  gone  in  with 
the  consent  of  a  majority  of  his  Brethren,  who  knew,  for 
the  facts  were  distinctly  brought  to  their  attention,  that 
by  deed  and  word  he  had  compromised  the  doctrine  of  the 
essential  divinity  of  Jesus  Christ.  Thank  God  the  reason- 
ing is  utterly  fallacious  and  the  conclusions  fall  to  the 
ground.  If  such  logic  were  to  be  allowed,  it  would  follow 
that  there  was  a  place  in  our  Episcopate  for  almost  every 
heresy  which  has  ever  cursed  the  world,  since  there  have 
been  heretical  Bishops  of  many  kinds  and  names  in  the 
highest  places  in  the  Church.  Nay,  worse,  we  should  be 
compelled  to  condone  immorality,  since  Bishops,  who  must 
be  nameless,  have  knelt  to  receive  imposition  of  hands,  who 
were  thoroughly  bad  men.  I  am  amazed,  and  more  than 
amazed,  that  any  man  who  holds  the  office  of  a  Bishop 
could  so  far  seem  to  forget  his  duty  to  God  as  a  trustee, 
as  to  delude  himself  into  the  belief  that  he  could  throw7  the 
responsibility  of  his  acts  in  the  administration  of  his  trust, 
and  that  too  in  its  highest  exercise,  upon  others,  and  say, 
"such  and  such  men  held  these  or  similar  views  and  were 
accepted,  and  hence  I  may  give  my  approval  without 
blame."  Again,  I  say,  no  one  would  for  one  moment  treat 
his  own  earthly  trusts  in  this  way.  It  is  the  reverse  of 
worldly  prudence  in  affairs,  and  I  cannot  conceive  of  any 
business  being  safely  transacted  on  these  terms.  Nay, 


37 

Bishops  themselves,  when  speaking  theoretically,  and  not 
acting  under  the  constraint  of  potent  influences  in  spe- 
cific cases,  give  forth  no  uncertain  sound.  Listen  to  the 
language  of  the  report  of  the  Bishops  of  our  Church  on 
Christian  Unity,  adopted  unanimously  in  1886.  I  add  a 
portion  of  it  as  an  appendix.  (Appendix  10.)  Listen  again 
to  such  brave  words  as  these  which  you  yourself  wrote, 
and  with  which  the  public  are  already  familiar,  since  they 
met  our  eye  daily  during  the  months  of  June  and  July  of 
the  last  year  at  the  bottom  of  the  pages  of  our  Church 
Almanac.  Brave  words  they  are,  and  they  deserve  to  be 
perpetuated  and  sounded  out  so  that  all  may  hear  them. 
"But,  I  believe,"  you  say  "that  we  are  bound  to  remem- 
ber two  things.  First,  that  truth  cannot  be  sacrificed 
to  anything.  The  danger  in  the  Roman  direction  is  to 
make  light  of  truth,  in  dwelling  much  upon  order,  and  the 
danger  in  the  Protestant  direction  is  to  set  schemes  or 
species  of  union  above  truth,"  this  for  June;  still  better,  if 
it  be  possible,  for  July.  You  tell  us,  and  it  braces  one  up 
to  hear  the  noble  words,  "the  fact  is,  that  unless  we  main- 
tain our  Order  intact,  and  hold  fast  positively  to  every 
article  of  faith,  which  the  Church  has  set  forth  in  the  an- 
cient Creeds,  we  have  nothing  whatever  to  offer  those 
whom  we  seek  to  draw  into  closer  oneness  with  our- 
selves. If  these  things  are  important,  they  are  trusts  which 
we  cannot  surrender,  no  matter  how  tempting  the  pro- 
posal may  be"  These  principles,  so  luminously  stated  in 
the  Report  on  Christian  Unity,  and  by  yourself,  who  were 
speaking  to  thousands  of  Churchmen,  by  a  singular  co- 
incidence, during  the  first  two  months  of  the  summer  of  1891, 


38 

so  valiantly  for  the  maintenance  of  the  Catholic  faith  and 
order  at  any  cost,  these  principles  are  true. 

It  is  a  trite  saying,  that  ':a  man  is  known  by  the  com- 
pany which  he  keeps."  The  fellowship  of  the  first  believers 
was  with  the  Apostles. 

It  occasions  some  perplexity  when  a  Churchman's  con- 
stituency is  made  up  chiefly  of  those  who  refuse  the  Catholic 
faith  and  reject  the  Apostolic  Order,  and  whose  commenda- 
tion is  sounded  largely  by  alien  voices,  and  in  words  not 
restrained  by  the  reverence  which  animates  those  who  were 
brought  up  in  the  school  of  liturgic  worship.  I  am  not 
speaking  of  social  affiliations,  but  I  have  in  mind  theologi- 
cal sympathies,  and  1  have  been  appalled  with  statements 
of  laudation  and  approval  from  quarters  and  in  language 
which  must  be,  it  would  seem  to  me.  exquisitely  painful 
and  distressing  to  one  who  found  himself  a  Bishop  in  the 
Church  of  God. 

Be  it  observed,  my  Brother,  we  are  brought  face  to  face 
with  a  fact  which,  antecedently,  I  could  not  have  been  per- 
suaded to -believe — that  we  have,  with  the  consent  of  a 
majority  of  our  Bishops,  a  presbyter  admitted  to  the  Epis- 
copate without  any  apology,  withdrawal  or  explanation, 
who  has,  by  repeated  utterances  and  acts,  treated  with 
little  or  no  consideration  the  authority  of  the  Church  in 
her  provisions  for  the  guardianship  of  her  faith  and  polity  r 
and  whose  conduct  and  teaching  in  these  respects  have  been 
matters  of  public  notoriety  for  years,  so  that  he  has  comer 
in  consequence,  to  be  regarded  by  the  outside  world  as  the 
great  apostle  of  what  it  calls  '•Liberality." 


39 

•_ 

At  the  risk  of  repeating  myself,  I  desire  to  place  on  re- 
cord ray  distinct  and  deliberate  and  unalterable  position  in 
reference  to  the  issues  involved  in  this  consecration,  until 
some  retraction  is  made  or  satisfactory  explanation  is  given. 
It  is  not  in  any  sense,  as  I  have  said,  a  question  of  party. 
If  it  were,  I  should  not  have  been  found  in  the  opposition 
with  Bishops  of  every  shade  of  theological  opinion. 
If  it  were,  I  would  justly  discredit  myself  with  others, 
and  forfeit  my  own  self-respect.  Nor,  again,  is  there 
one  particle  of  personal  feeling,  which  affects  or  qualifies 
my  position.  My  relation  to  this  matter  would  be  the 
same  were  the  party  concerned  my  father  or  my  brother. 
I  am  not  conscious  of  aught  but  the  kindest  feelings  to- 
wards him  whose  consecration  I  regard  as  most  disastrous 
and  injurious  to  our  Communion.  It  is  not  his  fault  that 
he  is  where  he  is.  His  acts  and  words  have  not  been  done 
or  spoken  "in  a  corner"  They  have  been  the  public  prop- 
erty of  the  nation  for  years.  And,  once  more,  my  refusal 
to  consent  and  acquiesce  is  not  based  in  the  slighest  degree 
upon  what  others  have  said  or  written;  it  rests  entirely 
upon  the  unquestioned  deeds  and  statements  of  the  emi- 
nent personage  himself.  I  do  not  say  that  his  positions, 
as  defined  by  what  he  has  said  and  done,  are  in  themselves 
wrong — that  is  a  different  question — but  I  am  convinced 
that  they  are  absolutely  inconsistent  with  the  Episcopal 
oath  and  vows,  provided  words,  not  here  or  there,  but 
everywhere,  are  allowed  to  have  their  obvious  and  current 
meaning,  and  are  not  made  of  none  effect  by  novel  "inter- 
pretations." 


40 

* 

I  found  myself,  therefore,  in  the  ordering  of  God's  provi- 
dence, compelled  either  to  refuse  consent  to  this  consecra- 
tion or  to  stultif3"  myself — nay,  worse,  as  I  view  the  matter, 
I  am  speaking  for  myself,  and  mean  no  disrespect  to  others, 
and  cannot  be  responsible  for  inferences.  Nay,  worse,  I 
say,  for  we  live,  as  Bishops,  under  the  obligation  of  vows 
and  a  most  solemn  oath,  I  felt  myself  compelled  either 
to  refuse  consent  or  to  be  disloyal  to  the  trust  com- 
mitted to  our  keeping,  and  unfaithful  to  the  Church  of 
God,  not  simply  in  these  United  States,  but  to  the  Catholic 
Church  throughout  the  world  now  militant  upon  earth,  and 
more  to  the  Church  of  the  past — the  Church  of  the  Apos- 
tolic age,  the  Church  of  St.  Cyprian,  the  Church  of  St. 
Chrysostom,  and  St,  Gregory,  and  St.  Augustine,  the 
Church  to  which  our  Keformers  appealed  in  their  sharp 
trials  of  confessorship  and  martyrdom.  I  have  not  given 
pledges  to  the  heterogeneous  multitude  made  up  of  every 
conceivable  sect  and  name,  which  has  been  shouting  for 
months,  "Consecrate  him,  consecrate  him ;  if  you  do  not 
consecrate  him  you  are  not  the  world's  friend,"  but  I  have 
given  pledges  and  an  oath  to  the  One  Holy  Catholic  and 
Apostolic  Church  of  the  past,  through  the  ages  all  along, 
and  of  the  present,  diffused  throughout  the  earth,  to  keep 
the  faith  undefiled,  and  maintain  and  hand  on  the  three- 
fold ministry.  I  have  never  fluxed  the  Creed  or  the  Ordinal 
with  any  theory  or  interpretation  of  my  own.  Who  am  I, 
that  I  dare  be  guilty  of  such  monstrous  presumption,  of 
such  an  awful  impiety? 

The  Creed  and  the  Ordinal  have  stood  in  their  essential 
principles  the  same  from  the  beginning.  The  Catholic 


41 

Church  has  interpreted  them,  if  they  needed  interpretation, 
by  her  practice  in  the  ages  all  along.  She  has  successfully 
resisted  the  private  interpretations  of  Ariusand  Apollinarius, 
and  Nestorius  and  Eutyches,  and  Honorius  and  Erigeiia, 
and  Luther  and  Calvin,  and  she  will  resist  these  private 
interpretations  to  the  end.  But  as  in  the  past,  so  in  the 
present,  there  is  danger  lest  though  the  fickleness  of  the 
people  or  the  pusillanimity  and  treason  of  her  rulers,  por- 
tions of  the  Lord's  heritage  should  be  surrendered  to  the 
enemy  and  lose  their  position  as  branches  of  the  Catholic 
Church.  This  is  our  danger  now.  Men  there  are  who  stand 
forth  as  champions  of  negations,  who  refuse  Moses  and  the 
Prophets,  who  discredit  the  Bible  as  the  Word  of  God,  who 
reject  the  Articles,  who  make  the  Creeds  meaningless  or 
worse  by  their  interpretations,  whose  names  insult  Chris- 
tianity as  corresponding  editors  of  infidel  publications,  and 
who  inspire  the  godless  multitude  with  an  estimate  of  them- 
selves, and  the  authority  which  is  over  them  in  the  Lord, 
which  is  expressed  in  caricatures  in  comic  newspapers, 
where  surplice  and  stole  and  rochet  and  lavyn  sleeves  are 
made  the  jest  of  thousands.  These  men  wax  bold  and  de- 
fiant when  one  of  themselves,  whose  sympathy  they  enjoy 
passes  into  the  Episcopate  with  the  oath  of  conformity 
and  the  pledges  of  obedience  of  the  Ordinal.  There  is  danger, 
I  say,  imminent  danger,  of  our  Church  losing  her  candle- 
stick, and  sinking  in  darkness  out  of  communion  with  the 
Catholic  Church  into  fellowship  with  those,  who  deny  the 
Lord  that  bought  them  with  His  precious  blood,  and  the 
blessed  Trinity  and  the  official  ministry,  and  becoming,  as 
she  would  be,  and  would  earn  for  herself  the  degradation 


42 

of  being  the  most  contemptible  of  sects.  I  have  used  every 
available  means  within  my  reach  to  avert  this  blow  from 
our  branch  of  the  Church,  and  now  that  it  has  fallen,  per- 
haps it  may  be  my  privilege  and  my  honor  henceforth  to 
suffer  shame  for  His  dear  Name,  Who  has  called  me  to  this 
high  estate.  I  pray  God  that  I  may  have  grace  to  stand 
unmoved  amid  the  strife  of  tongues,  and  steadfastly  to  con- 
tinue to  the  end,  not  far  off,  in  the  Apostles'  doctrine  and 
fellowship,  and  the  breaking  of  the  bread,  and  the  prayers. 
The  present,  in  all  that  is  evanescent  in  sight  and  sound 
will  soon  pass  away,  and  the  real  issue  will  abide  in  bold 
relief.  As  we  look  back,  my  Brother,  upon  the  fourth  and 
fifth  ages  of  the  Church,  we  do  not  much  occupy  ourselves 
with  the  wealth  of  the  Eastern  Empire  or  the  prowess  of 
the  West,  we  are  not  dazzled  by  the  splendor  of  Con- 
stantius'  Court,  or  the  jewels  of  Justina,  we  do  not  think 
about,  save  to  pity,  the  wretched  timeserving  Bishops, 
who  sold  their  faith  for  a  temporary  flash  of  this  world's 
glory,  for  a  mere  mess  of  pottage,  but  we  look  with  the  pro- 
foundest  reverence  and  thankfulness  to  God  upon  the  com- 
manding forms  of  St.  Athanasius,  in  his  exile,  St.  Basil, 
with  his  sheepskin,  St.  Chrysostom,  unyielding  beneath  the 
frowns  and  threats  of  imperial  wealth  and  beauty,  and  St. 
Ambrose,  counting  his  life  worthless  in  comparison  with 
fidelity  to  his  divine  Master.  The  evanescent  of  those 
days  has  long  since  been  buried  in  oblivion,  and  the  real 
alone  remains,  the  champions  of  the  Catholic  faith,  and 
those  who  set  themselves  in  array  against  Christ — Christ 
and  antichrist.  We  see  them  somewhat  as  we  shall  see  them 
in  the  judgment  of  God  at  the  end.  So  now  with  us  the  din  of 


43 

voices  will  soon  be  hushed,  the  newspapers  with  their  words  of 
sharp  denunciation  or  sycophantic  praise,  the  frowns,  the 
smiles,  the  sneers,  the  personalities  will  ere  long  be  forgotten, 
and  the  entire  generation  of  men  now  living  will  die  and  be 
buried,  but  the  real  issue  of  this  consecration  will  abide  and 
be  measured  and  understood.  In  any  event  it  awaits  the  just 
judgment  of  God,  and  in  reference  to  that  awful  ordeal  I 
would  not  for  all  that  creation  could  bestow  shift  my  po- 
sition one  hair's  breadth  from  that  on  which  I  stand,  for  I 
hear  my  Lord  asking  me,  "what  is  a  man  profited  if  he 
shall  gain  the  whole  world  and  lose  his  own  soul."  "So, 
then,  every  one  of  us  must  give  account  of  himself  to  God." 

GEORGE  F.  SEYMOUR, 

Bishop  of  Springfield. 
SPRINGFIELD,  ILL,.,  Sept.  1,  1892. 


APPENDICES. 


APPENDIX  I. 


MY  CIRCULAR  LETTER  TO  THE  BISHOPS. 


SPRINGFIELD,  ILL.,  May  16,  1891. 


To  the  Eight  Reverend. 

Bishop  of... 


RT.  REV.  AND  DEAR  BRO.:  We  have  reached  a  crisis  in 
the  history  of  our  Church. 

The  Bishops,  in  my  judgment,  in  the  event  of  the  Rev. 
Dr.  Brooks'  confirmation  as  Bishop-elect  of  Massachusetts, 
coming  before  them  for  approval,  will  be  called  upon  to 
answer,  each  to  his  God  and  to  the  Church,  whether  he 
holds  and  believes — 

1.  Episcopal  ordination  as  necessary  to  authorize  a  man 
to  minister  in  holy  things,  and  especially  to  celebrate  the 
Holy  Communion  or  not. 

2.  The  three  orders  of  the  Sacred  Ministry  as  of  divine 
appointment  or  not;  and 

3.  The  homoousion   (oj^ioovffiov),  the  essential  divinity 
of  our  Blessed  Lord,  to  be  of  the  Faith  (de  fide)  or  not?. 


46 

How  any  Bishop  of  our  Communion,  with  the  vows  of 
his  Episcopate  upon  him,  with  the  oath  of  his  consecration 
binding  him,  with  the  Prayer  Book  in  its  services,  offices, 
articles  and  ordinal  before  him,  and  with  the  terms  pro- 
posed as  a  basis  of  Christian  unity  by  the  unanimous  voice 
of  the  House  of  Bishops  committing  him,  can  give  a  nega- 
tive answer  to  these  questions,  passes  my  comprehension. 

The  confirmation  and  consecration  of  the  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks, 
unless  he  recalls  and  withdraws  his  repeated  statements, 
and  explains  his  avowed  sympathy  with  those  who  disown 
and  repudiate  the  divinity  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  I  re- 
gard as  most  disastrous  to  our  Branch  of  the  Church  of 
God,  since  our  Episcopate  will  thus  be  committed  to  the 
position  that  the  polity  of  the  Church  Catholic,  and  the  faith 
once  delivered  unto  the  saints,  as  touching  its  fundamental 
article  in  the  creed  of  Christendom,  are  matters  indifferent. 

No  one  can  forecast  the  horrible  consequences  which  will 
follow  such  a  position,  deliberately  taken  by  the  major 
number  of  the  Bishops  as  representing  our  Church. 

I  feel  it  to  be  my  duty,  under  the  obligations  of  my  vows 
as  a  Bishop  in  the  Church  of  God,  and  as  bound  by  my 
oath,  and  as  fearing  the  just  judgment  of  God,  if  I  forbear 
to  raise  a  note  of  warning  to  my  brethren,  to  address  to 
them  this  letter  in  the  confidence  of  our  relation  to  each 
other  as  sharing  in  the  same  awful  responsibility  of  main- 
taining the  faith  pure  and  undefiled,  and  handing  it  on  as 
we  received  it  to  those  who  are  very  soon  to  succeed  us 
in  our  trust  of  the  sacred  deposit  of  faith  and  orders  for 
the  sake  of  all  mankind. 


47 

With  sincere  fraternal   regard,  and   in  deep    anguish  of 

spirit,  faithfully  yours, 

GEORGE  F.  SEYMOUR, 

Bishop  of  Springfield. 

P.  S. — Perhaps  I  ought  to  add  that  the  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks 
is  an  absolute  stranger  to  me.  I  have  never,  to  my  knowl- 
edge, spoken  to  him,  and  there  is  not,  in  my  relation  to 
this  question,  the  slightest  admixture  of  personal  feeling.  I 
can  truly  say  that  my  course  would  be  the  same  were  my 
father,  or  brother,  or  son,  or  dearest  friend  to  be  substi- 
tuted in  this  issue  for  Dr.  Brooks.  It  is  a  question  of  loy- 
alty to  our  Lord,  and  to  His  Church ;  it  is  a  question  which 
touches  my  own  salvation.  G.  F.  S. 


APPENDIX  II. 


LETTERS  ADDRESSED  BY  ME  TO  THE  REV.  DR  PHILLIPS  BROOKS, 
WITH  A  VIEW  TO  ENABLE  ME  TO  GlVE  MY  CONSENT  TO  HlS 
CONSECRATION,  AND  HIS  REPLIES. 


ON  THE  CARS,  IN  MOTION,  GOING  TO 

DENVER,  COLORADO,  May  30,  1891. 
Rev.  and  Dear  Bro.: 

This  note  is  written  by  a  man  to  a  man.  I  am  person- 
ally a  stranger  to  you,  but  we  are  of  the  same  household 
of  faith,  and  are  brought  into  close  relation  to  each  other 
by  what  may  be  called  an  accident  in  life. 

Possibly  you  and  I  are  both  misunderstood,  and  are  so 
situated  that  it  is  almost  impossible  for  us  to  remove  the 
misapprehension,  which  prevails,  without  a  sacrifice  of  self- 
respect,  which  we  ought  not  to  make,  and  cannot  make. 

I  am  bound  by  the  most  sincere  conviction  of  its  truth, 
as  well  as  by  oath  to  uphold  the  essential  divinity  of  our 
Blessed  Lord  enshrined  in  the  o^oovaiov  of  the  Nicene 
Creed.  (Note — My  ink  in  fountain  pen  gives  out,  and  I 
must  use  lead  pencil,  pardon,  please,  paper  and  pencil.) 

Information  reaches  me  from  various  sources  that  you 
do  not  accept  the  Virgin  birth  of  Jesus  and  the  resurrec- 
tion of  His  Body,  or  if  you  do  not  go  so  far  yourself,  that 
you  maintain  that  the  denial  of  these  Articles  of  the 


49 

Catholic  Faith  is  not  inconsistent  with  a  man's  taking 
Holy  Orders,  or  if  ordained,  remaining  in  the  ministry, 
and  teaching  his  negations  of  these  verities,  while  clothed 
with  the  authority  and  acting  under  the  sanction  of  the. 
Church. 

Such  assertions,  my  Brother,  are  confidently  made,  and 
facts  are  adduced  in  confirmation,  as  alleged  letters  writ- 
ten by  you  to  the  Rev. ,  of  sympathy 

with  him  in  his  assaults  upon  Holy  Scripture,  and  the 
supernatural  birth  and  bodily  resurrection  of  Jesus  Christ ; 
your  association  of  yourself  with  Unitarians  in  acts  of 
public  worship,  and  assertions  of  yours  in  private  conver- 
sation to  the  effect  that  you  did  not  accept  the  faith  in 
the  incarnation  of  our  Lord,  as  it  is  believed  in  by  most 
Christians. 

Now  I  am  placed  in  a  most  painful  position.  The  Faith 
is  dearer  to  me  than  all  else,  than  life  itself.  I  am  asked 
to  give  my  consent  to  the  consecration  of  one  about  whom 
gather  clouds  of  doubt  and  misgiving  as  to  his  soundness 
in  belief  touching  the  truth  of  truths,  as  I  hold  it,  and  as 
the  Church  holds  and  teaches. 

Now,  Brother,  what  am  I  to  do  in  such  a  case?  What 
would  the  State  do  if  there  were  any  question  about  the 
loyalty  of  one  of  her  citizens,  whom  she  was  about  to 
honor  with  the  command  of  a  squadron  in  her  navy,  or  a 
division  of  her  army?  Would  she  not  in  some  way  clear 
up  the  doubt  before  she  made  the  appointment,  and  would 
she  not  be  justified  in  so  doing?  Nay,  would  she  not  on 


50 

every  account  be  compelled  to  pursue  such  a  course? 
Would  not  the  citizen  himself  welcome  such  an  investiga- 
tion? 

You  remember  what  capital  was  made  in  the  last  Presi- 
dential campaign  out  of  an  incautious  expression  of  politi- 
cal sympathy  by  the  British  Minister. 

It  adds  to  the  complications  of  your  case  that  the  secular, 
sectarian  and  infidel  press  take  very  great  interest  in  your 
confirmation,  and  hearty  friendship  and  sympathy  are  pro- 
fessed by  those,  who  in  so  doing  damage  your  reputation 
as  a  Nicene  Christian,  and  injure  your  cause  as  a  Bishop- 
Delect. 

-Now,  my  dear  Brother,  under  these  delicate  complica- 
tions and  distressing  circumstances,  what  course  ought  to 
be  pursued? 

I  have  my  own  view,  but  it  may  not  be  yours,  and  if  I 
state  it,  you  are  in  no  way  committed  to  adopt  it.  You 
may  leave  this  letter  unanswered,  and  I  shall  feel  in  no 
way  aggrieved.  I  recognize  the  fact  that  I  am  intruding 
upon  you,  and  you  may  feel  annoyed  at  my  apparent  pre- 
sumption. 

I  may  be  making  a  mistake,  if  so,  let  me  beg  of  you  to 
believe  that  it  is  an  error  of  judgment,  not  of  intention 
or  heart. 

I  may  not  be  able  to  put  myself  in  your  place,  because 
you  may  hold  views  of  interpretation  of  the  Bible  and  for- 
mulated  statements  of  doctrine  in  which  I  do  not  share, 
and  hence  your  relation  to  the  present  issue  would  be 
modified  bv  such  views. 


51 

But  looking  at  the  question  as  I  do,  if  doubts  had  arisen 
through  my  own  words  and  conduct,  ungenerously  con- 
strued perhaps,  which  placed  me  in  a  false  position,  so  that 
I  would  be  misunderstood  without  explanation,  I  would  in 
some  way  strive  to  set  myself  right. 

You  are  the  better  able  to  do  this,  because  no  one  could 
justly  suspect  or  misinterpret  your  motives. 

The  Episcopate  of  Massachusetts  could  not  be  an  object 
of  ambition  to  Phillips  Brooks.  Your  integrity  of  charac- 
ter, your  truth  and  honor  are  above  all  price,  and  with 
the  Ordinal  and  the  Episcopal  Oath  confronting  you  in 
consecration,  these  are  brought  into  question  in  the  minds 
of  some,  I  may  say  of  very  many. 

If  I  have  made  a  mistake  in  addressing  you,  pardon  me, 
dear  Brother.  If  I  can  in  any  way  serve  you,  I  am  ready 
to  do  my  best  loyally  and  truly. 

Respectfully  and  faithfully  yours, 

GEORGE  F.  SEYMOUR. 

For  the  REV.  PHILLIPS  BROOKS,  D.  D., 

Boston,  Mass. 


EEPLY  or  BISHOP  BROOKS  TO  THE  FOREGOING  LETTER. 


283  CLARENDON  ST.,  BOSTON,  June  3, 1891. 

Dear  Bishop  Seymoui': 

I  thank  you  for  the  friendliness  and  courtesy  of  your 
note,  and  I  wish  very  much  that  I  had  it  in  my  power  to 
relieve  the  perplexity  in  which  you  find  yourself. 


52 

But  I  beg  you  to  think  carefully,  and  see  whether  it  is  at 
all  right  that  I  should  make  special  exposition  of  my  faith 
and  justification  of  my  actions  under  the  present  circum- 
stances, and  with  reference  to  the  approaching  vote  of  the 
Bishops  upon  my  nomination  to  the  Bishopric  of  Massa- 
chusetts. 

I  have  been  for  thirty-two  years  a  minister  of  the  Church, 
and  I  have  used  her  services  joyfully  and  without  complaint, 
I  have  preached  in  many  places,  and  with  the  utmost  free- 
dom. I  have  written  and  published  many  volumes,  which 
I  have  no  right  to  ask  anybody  to  read,  but  which  will 
give  to  any  one  who  chooses  to  read  them  clear  under- 
standing of  my  way  of  thinking.  My  acts  have  never  been 
concealed. 

Under  these  circumstances,  I  cannot  think  it  well  to 
make  any  utterance  of  faith  or  pledge  of  purpose  at  the 
present  time.  Certainly  I  made  none  to  my  brethren  here, 
when  they  chose  me  to  be  their  Bishop,  and  I  cannot  help 
thinking  that  you  will  think  I  am  right  in  making  none 
now,  when  the  election  is  passing  to  its  final  stages. 

At  any  rate,  I  am  sure  you  will  believe  that  my  decision 
in  the  matter  is  made  not  merely  in  indulgence  of  my  own 
feelings,  but  with  most  serious  consideration  of  what  seem 
to  me  to  be  the  best  interests  of  the  Church  which  we  love. 

I  must  beg  you  to  be  assured  of  this,  and  to  believe  me. 
Very  faithfully  and  truly  yours, 

PHILLIPS  BROOKS. 


53 

MY  SECOND  LETTER  TO  THE  REV.  DK.  BROOKS. 


DENVER,  COL.,  June  9,  1891. 

Rev.  and  Dear  Brother: 

I  thank  you  for  your  courteous  reply  to  my  note. 

You  will  pardon  me  for  drawing  your  attention  to  a 
fundamental  distinction,  which  differentiates  your  case  from 
any  other  which  has  fallen  under  my  observation,  and 
which,  I  trust,  you  will  so  far  appreciate  as  to  see  in  it  a 
justification,  from  my  point  of  view,  for  approaching  you 
with  my  former  letter. 

In  other  instances,  inferences  have  been  drawn  from  the 
associations  of  men  with  Church  parties,  and  they  have 
been  identified  with  views  and  opinions  which  they  may  or 
may  not  have  adopted,  and  popular  clamor  and  prejudice 
have  been  excited  against  them  in  consequence. 

In  your  case,  the  issue  raised  is  not  one  of  Church  parties 
or  schools,  of  high,  low  or  broad.  Were  such  the  case  you 
would  never  have  heard  from  me;  you  would  have  had  my 
hearty  approval  from  the  outset,  as  I  feel  that  a  Diocese 
should  have  its  own  choice  respected  in  the  selection  of  a 
chief  pastor. 

But  in  your  case  the  question  passes  beyond  Church  par- 
ties and  schools  to  the  fundamental  verity  of  the  Christian 
Faith,  and  the  doubts  excited  were  occasioned  by  alleged 
acts  and  words  of  your  own,  running  through  several  years 
of  your  exceptionally  brilliant  ministry.  It  is  this  fact,  and 


54 

this  alone,  which  brought  me  to  you,  my  dear  Brother,  for 
explanation,  as  you  alone  could  remove  the  anxiety. 

The  6j*oovffior  of  the  Nicene  Creed,  accepted  in  the  ages 
all  along  by  the  Church  Catholic,  has  closed  forever  the 
questions  touching  our  Blessed  Lord's  divinity.  No  inter- 
pretation or  practice  can  be  allowed  which  would  deprave 
the  precious  doctrine  enshrined  in  that  term,  or  suggest 
the  inference  that  it  was  a  matter  indifferent  whether 
it  were  maintained  as  of  supreme  importance  or  not. 

A  Bishop  is  bound  by  his  oath  to  protect  the  faith,  and 
hence  you  must  see,  my  Brother,  the  extremely  painful  and 
delicate  position  in  which  I  find  myself  placed  in  relation 
to  your  confirmation.  It  is  not  what  others  have  said 
about  you,  but  what  you  are  reported  to  have  said  your- 
self, on  several  occasions,  and  acts  more  significant  and 
conclusive  than  words,  which  you,  as  it  is  alleged,  have 
done.  You  alone  could  remove  these  doubts,  which  could 
not,  in  my  mind  have  been  excited,  in  the  face  of  your  long 
and  faithful  ministry,  by  any  one  except  yourself.  Hence, 
as  a  man  and  a  Bishop,  I  went  directly  to  you,  as  the 
only  one  who  could  relieve  me  from  my  distress. 

This  is  my  justification  for  my  letter  to  you.  I  did  not 
see,  I  do  not  see,  how  I  could  do  otherwise,  if  I  wished  to 
reach  the  truth.  I  venture  to  think  that  you  have  not 
appreciated  the  real  bearings  of  the  situation  as  it  presents 
itself  to  some  of  us — at  all  events,  to  one  who  would  pro- 
tect your  honor  as  jealously  and  sacredly  as  his  own. 

I  have  written  on  my  own  responsibility  alone,  and  I  may 
add  for  myself,  that  as  to  the  salvation  of  Christians  of 


55 

other  names — of  Unitarians  and  of  the  heathen — probably 
my  comprehensiveness  is  as  largely  inclusive  as  your  own. 
Of  course,  my  dear  Brother,  this  note  calls  for  no  reply. 
Respectfully  and  sincerely,  yours, 

GEORGE  F.  SEYMOUR. 
For  the  REV.  DR.  PHILLIPS  BROOKS, 

Bishop-elect,  Boston,  Mass. 


233  CLARENDON  ST.,  BOSTON,  MASS., 

June  13,  1891. 
My  Dear  Bishop  Seymour: 

I  thank  you  for  your  letter.  Some  day  we  shall  meet, 
I  hope,  and  talk  over  all  this.  Meanwhile  I  must  say 
nothing,  except  to  assure  you  that  I  am 

Yours  sincerely, 

PHILLIPS  BROOKS. 
The  RIGHT  REVEREND  DR.  SEYMOUR. 


These  letters  of  Bishop  Brooks  were  not  written  for  pub- 
lication any  more  than  were  mine.  I  could  not  very  well 
print  my,  own  without  including  his  also,  and  I  feel  no 
hesitation  in  doing  so  without  consulting-  the  Bishop,  who 
is  in  Europe,  and  obtaining  his  consent,  because  they  are 
in  themselves  so  admirable. 

While  they  do  not  give  me  the  satisfaction  which  I  sought 
to  obtain,  still  in  another  way  they  do,  and  that  most 
emphatically.  Doctor,  now  Bishop  Brooks,  refers  me  to 
his  published  writings,  and  his  acts,  which  he  says,  very 
truly,  were  "never  concealed,"  for  an  explanation  of  his 


56 

faith  and  his  administration  of  the  offices  and  sacraments 
of  the  Church.  This  declaration  brings  his  books  and  con- 
duct, covering;  the  later  years  of  his  ministry,  before  the 
public,  as  his  acknowledged  exposition  of  his  beliefs  and 
principles  of  official  action  as  a  Presbyter  in  the  Church. 
It  was  these  sermons  and  addresses  an$  acts  on  public 
occasions  which  caused  my  perplexity  and  distress  and  sent 
me  to  him,  their  author,  for  relief. 

When  it  was  announced  that  a  majority  of  the  Bishops 
had  consented  to  his  consecration,  I  felt  that  Dr.  Brooks' 
status  was  altered,  and  that  restraints,  which  had  hitherto 
kept  his  lips  sealed,  as  he  implied  in  his  letter,  were  removed, 
and  that  in  consequence,  if  he  were  rightly  approached,  he 
might  now  make  some  statement,  which  would  lessen,  if  it 
did  not  cure  the  distress  which  his  consecration  would 
occasion  thousands  of  Churchmen  throughout  the  world. 

Accordingly  I  appealed  to  the  Presiding  Bishop,  who  by 
age  and  position  seemed  to  me  to  be  the  proper  person  to 
address  Dr.  Brooks,  and  obtain  from  him,  if  he  could,  some 
such  statement. 


APPENDIX  III. 


MY  LETTER  TO  THE  PRESIDING  BISHOP,  URGING  HIM  TO  APPROACH 
THE  REV.  DR.  BROOKS. 


SPRINGFIELD,  ILL.,  BISHOP'S  HOUSE, 
August  11,  1891. 

Ht.  Rev.  and  Dear  Bro.: 

Now  that  the  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks  has  been  confirmed  as 
Bishop-elect  by  a  majority  of  our  Bishops,  and  order  has 
been  taken  for  his  consecration,  and  publication  has  been 
made  of  the  same,  the  reasons,  which  from  delicacy  have 
hitherto  closed  his  lips,  have  been  removed,  and  it  is  now 
within  his  choice,  with  perfect  propriety,  to  relieve  himself 
from  the  suspicion  which  his  own  acts  and  words  have 
brought  upon  him,  and  the  Church  from  the  damaging  con- 
sequences which  must  arise,  in  case  he  be  consecrated  with- 
out such  explanation. 

Whatever  you  or  other  Bishops  may  think,  the  outside 
world  insists  through  its  press,  that  the  issues  settled  by 
the  admission  of  the  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks  to  the  Episcopate, 
are  that  the  Polity  and  the  Faith  of  the  Church  are  mat- 
ters indifferent  henceforth,  and  that  the  acknowledgment 
of  Episcopal  ordination,  as  necessary  to  qualify  one  to  ad- 
minister the  sacraments,  and  of  belief  in  the  essential  di- 


58 

vinity  of.  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  are   no   longer   required 
from  those  who  are  to  be  consecrated  Bishops. 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  private  opinions  of  Bishops 
in  days  gone  by,  or  may  be  of  Bishops  now,  the  case  has 
never  so  far  occurred,  where  the  repudiation  of  Episcopacy 
and  the  treating  the  essential  verities  of  the  faith  of  the 
Gospel,  as  matters  indifferent,  have  been  made  the  issues 
on  which  a  man's  admission  to  the  Episcopate  have  turned. 
Such  is  the  case  DOW. 

You  are  the  Bishop,  as  our  Metropolitan,  who  can  with 
the  most  propriety  approach  the  Rev.  Dr.  Broo'ks,  in  refer- 
ence to  what  seems  to  others  as  well  as  myself,  due  from 
him  to  the  American  Church,  in  view  of  what  he  has  said 
and  done,  and  the  use  which  the  secular,  Roman  Catholic, 
sectarian  and  infidel  press  is  making  of  his  name,  to  the 
injury  of  our  Lord's  Kingdom  on  earth. 

I  regret  to  be  obliged  to  intrude  upon  you  again,  but 
conscience  and  a  sense  of  duty  compel  me  to  do  so,  as  a 
step  antecedent  to  others,  which  must  be  taken,  in  case 
this  fails  of  its  effect. 

May  God  help  us  and  strengthen  us  to  do  our  duty  in 
this  crisis,  fearless  of  consequences  to  ourselves. 

Very  faithfully  yours, 

GEORGE  F.  SEYMOUR. 

For  the  RT.  REV.  DR.  WILLIAMS, 

Presiding-  Bishop, 

Middletown,  Conn. 

P.  S.  It  is  my  purpose  to  send  copies  of  this  letter  to 
two  or  three  Bishops  of  our  Church. 


59 

To  this  letter  the  Presiding  Bishop  made  no  reply. 
Whether  he  approached  the  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks  I  do  not 
know.  Dr.  Brooks,  however,  so  far  as  I  am  informed, 
made  no  sign. 

This  letter,  however,  seemed  to  me  to  be  necessary,  in 
order  to  bring  home  to  the  Bishop  of  Connecticut  his  re- 
sponsibility, as  Presiding  Bishop,  and  as  about  to  conse- 
crate Dr.  Brooks,  and  also  as  a  step  properly  antecedent 
to  a  solemn  protest,  if  I  were  forced  ultimately  so  to  place 
mvself  on  record. 


APPENDIX  IV. 


PROTEST  PRESENTED  AND  BEAD  IMMEDIATELY  BEFORE  THE  CON- 
SECRATION OF  THE  REV.  DR.  BROOKS. 


Whereas,  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  the  United 
States  of  America  has  a  claim  on  the  allegiance  of  Catholic 
believers  only  on  the  ground  of  her  claim  to  be  considered 
a  branch  of  the  Catholic  Church; 

And  whereas,  the  recognition  of  heresy  indirect  as  well 
as  direct  goes  far  to  destroy  such  claim  in  the  case  of  any 
religious  body; 

And  whereas,  it  is  announced  by  authority  that  the  Kt. 
Rev.  the  Presiding  Bishop  and  other  Rt.  Rev.  Rulers  of  our 
Church  are  about  to  consecrate  as  Bishop,  one  who  has 
publicly  and  definitely  repudiated  the  doctrine  of  an  Apos- 
tolic Ministry  and  by  consequence  of  the  Holy  Catholic 
Church  as  always  held  by  the  Church  (and  proven  to  be  so 
held,  by  the  invariable  practice  of  ordaining  as  laymen  all 
ministers  of  the  various  Protestant  bodies  conforming  to 
her),  and  still  further,  who  has  publicly  and  openly  com- 
promised, if  not  repudiated  as  indifferent  his  belief  in  the 
doctrine  of  the  ever  Blessed  Trinity  and  the  homoousion 
of  the  Son  with  the  Father  as  affirmed  with  the  Creed  of 
Christendom,  by  inviting  those,  who  by  open  profession 


61 

and  life  deny  the  doctrines  of  the  Trinity  and  the  divinity 
of  Jesus  Christ,  to  receive  the  Holy  Communion,  which  act 
has  always  been  held  in  the  Catholic  Church  as  the  test  of 
recognition  as  an  orthodox  Christian,  and  is  so  formally 
declared  by  our  Church  as  requiring  the  recitation  of  the 
Apostles'  or  Nicene  Creed  as  a  qualification  antecedent  to 
reception,  with  no  abjuration  of  his  errors  on  the  part 
of  such  person,  thereby  giving  in  some  sort  recognition  to 
the  false  doctrines  which  he  maintains; 

And  whereas,  all  the  Dioceses  of  the  Church  are  connected 
together  by  so  close  an  intercommunion,  that  what  is  done 
by  common  authority  immediately  affects  them  all,  and 
every  Bishop,  Priest,  Deacon  and  Layman  connected  with 
the  same. 

On  these  grounds  therefore  we  in  our  place  being  Bishops 
of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  the  United  States  of 
America,  by  way  of  relieving  our  consciences  do  hereby 
solemnly  protest  against  said  consecration  and  disown  it 
as  removing  our  Church  from  its  present  ground  and  tend- 
ing to  her  disorganization  unless  the  said  Bishop-elect  shall 
before  the  consecration  abjure  and  disavow  his  false  teach- 
ing and  practice. 

GEORGE  F.  SEYMOUR, 

Bishop  of  Springfield. 
(Signed  by  two  Bishops.) 


NOTE. — Doubtless  more  Bishops  would  have  signed  had  I  been  allowed  by 
the  Assessor  of  the  Presiding  Bishop  to  learn  what  Bishops  declined  to  con- 
sent. This  information  was  refused  on  my  application  for  it  as  a  Bishop.  In 
such  a  crisis  I  wished  to  consult  my  Brethren,  who  agreed  with  me  as  to  the 
consecration,  as  to  what  was  best  to  be  done.  This  state  of  things  ought  not 
to  be  permitted  to  continue.  G.  F.  S. 


APPENDIX  V. 


UNITARIAN  BAPTISM:  DAMAGING  COMMENDATIONS. 


In  this  connection  I  desire  to  submit  facts  and  samples 
of  testimony,  which  conclusively  prove  that  our  Church,  the 
faithful  everywhere,  had  reason  to  expect,  nay,  had  a  right 
to  demand  that  the  chief  Pastors  of  the  flock  would  require 
some  explanation  or  retraction  touching  his  past  life  and 
conduct  as  a  clergyman  before  they  admitted  the  Bishop- 
elect  to  the  Episcopal  office. 

1.  His  status  as   a   baptized    man   is    open   to   serious 
-doubt,  as  the  service  was  performed,  it  is  alleged  and  never 
denied,  by  a  Unitarian  Minister,  and  waiving  the  issue  of 
the  validity  of  lay  baptism,  there  is  a  question  whether  the 
element  of  water  was  used,  and  still  further   whether  the 
form  of  words  prescribed  by  our  Lord  was  employed.    The 
Bishop-elect,  when  approached  upon  the  subject,  I  am  told, 
absolutely  refused  to  submit  to  hypothetical  baptism  with 
a  view  to  cure  any  doubts,  which  might  exist,  and  to  allay 
and  set  at  rest  the  painful  misgivings  of  thousands  of  his 
fellow  churchmen. 

2.  "A  man  is  known  by  the  company  which  he  keeps,"  is  a 
trite  sayins:,  which  embodies  a  recognized  truth.    It  was  the 


63 

principle  which  this  proverb  implies  which  led  to  the  ex- 
citement which  prevailed  at  the  time  the  present  Bishop  of 

London  was  advanced   to   the   See  of  Exeter.    In  Bishop 

» 

Temple's  case  there  was  nothing  to  excite  or  justify  sus- 
picion from  his  own  past  life  or  acts  or  words,  all  was 
based,  or  seemed  to  be  based  upon  the  single  fact  that  he 
was  in  bad  company  with  his  innocent  essay  in  the  volume, 
which  was  censured  by  the  Convocation  of  the  Province  of 
Canterbury.  What  then  is  to  be  said  of  a  case  where  the 
Bishop-elect's  associations  have  been  in  his  official  life 
very  largely  and  conspicuously  with  those,  who  refuse  the 
Church's  polity,  deny  her  creed  and  disown  and  oppose  her 
order,  and  whole  system?  Yet  such  has  been  notoriously 
the  case  with  the  present  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  through 
a  period  of  many  years,  if  current  public  testimony  is  to 
be  credited,  and  no  denial  or  attempt  at  explanation  has 
ever  been  made,  so  far  as  I  know,  or  have  reason  to  be- 
lieve. Prior  to  his  confirmation  the  secular  press  was  ex- 
tensively and  persistently  employed  by  the  friends  of  the 
Bishop-elect  to  promote  his  interests. 

In  order  to  exhibit  the  character  of  his  company,  the  sort 
of  men,  who  were  anxious  that  Dr.  Brooks  should  be  made 
a  Bishop  in  the  Church  of  God,  I  submit  the  following 
poetic  tribute  to  his  praise,  and  the  headlines,  which  con- 
dense the  spirit  of  the  testimony  of  the  ministers  of  several 
denominations,  which  fills  several  of  the  columns  of  the 
Boston  Herald  of  June  3d,  1891,  and  the  Boston  Daily 
Advertiser  of  October  13,  1891. 


64 

The  Boston  Herald,  Wednesday,  June  3d,  1891,  presents 
the  following;  summary  of  testimony  in  favor  of  the  Bishop 
elect : 

"All  Pay  him  Honor. —  Clerical  Views  of  Dr.  Brooks' 
election. — Various  Boston  divines  give  their  opinions.— As 
a  Bishop  he  would  do  much  for  Christianity. — Praise  for 
his  noble  piety  and  great  gifts. — His  choice  an  honor  to 
the  Episcopal  Church.'' — "Unitarians  would  welcome  Dr. 
Brooks'  confirmation  as  Bishop." — "Methodist  clergy  hail 
Dr.  Brooks'  election  as  a  wise  step." — "Baptist  opinion — 
The  Episcopal  office  will  limit  his  power  for  usefulness." 
"Grand  thing  for  Christianity. — Universalist '  divines  think 
the  Episcopal  Church  has  honored  itself."  "His  piety 
broad  and  noble. — Influence  to  which  a  Congregationalist 
attributes  his  election."  —  "A  Presbyterian  view — Defeat 
would  be  a  set  back  to  the  best  Christian  America  can 
offer." 

The  Boston  Advertiser  of  Tuesday,  October  13th,  1891, 
has  the  following  headlines  over  several  columns  of  testi- 
mony, and  the  sonnet,  which  I  submit  in  full: 

"Phillips  Brooks — The  man,  the  preacher,  the  Bishop-elect. 
Tributes  from  his  brother  clergymen  in  Boston — Admiration, 
respect  and  affection  are  mingled. — No  office  can  add  to  his 
present  station. — Fervent  words  from  the  Kev.  Drs.  Griffis, 
Horton,  Savage,  Lorrimer,  Rexford,  Little,  Haynes,  Horr, 
Herrick,  and  many  others."  —  "Heber  Newton's  plea. — He 
wants  Episcopal  Bishops  to  be  leaders,  and  is  greatly  en- 
couraged by  Dr.  Brooks'  election."  The  sonnet  follows: 


65      , 

'•God  said.  ;I  make  a  man:'  and  lo  the  creeds 
Broke  in  his  hands  as  did  the  withes  that  bound 
The  Hebrew  giant !    Not  that  he  was  found 
Careless  of  words,  but  that  all  human  needs 
Plead  with  "him  saying,  'Christlike  he  who  heeds 
Man's  want  and  sorrow,  putting  these  above 
All  forms  and  phrases  in  the  name  of  love: 
For  words  are  mockery  when  the  time  wants  deeds  !' 
And  in  this  spirit,  lo,  the  man  became 
Greater  than  creeds  or  office :  and  all  these 
He  used  for  ends  that  make  success  and  fame 
Seem  petty  as  pass  by  God's  centuries, 
And  so,  as  truth  and  love  transcend  all  books, 
The  man  transcends  the  Bishop,  Phillips  Brooks.'" 

Oct.  12,  1891.  M.  J.  SAVAGE. 

No  one,  I  am  sure,  wishes  to  abridge,  abate,  or  with- 
draw one  single  word  of  praise  which  Bishop  Brooks  re- 
ceives for  his  gifts  natural  and  acquired,  or  for  his  excel- 
lencies of  character,  but  when  commendation  comes  to  a 
man  from  the  antagonists  of  the  principles,  which  he  has 
deliberately  accepted  and  over  and  over  again  bound  him- 
self by  solemn  vow  and  promise  to  teach  and  uphold  on 
the  ground  of  his  liberality  in  compromising  those  princi- 
ples with  those  who  refuse  them  and  despise  them,  the 
feeling  is  very  different.  Socially  we  are  not  at  war  with 
Unitarians,  Congregationalists,  Methodists  and  Baptists, 
but  as  regards  the  faith,  and  polity,  and  administration  of 
God's  Church,  as  set  forth  in  our  Book  of  Common  Prayer 
in  its  creeds,  offices,  articles,  and  ordinal,  we  are  at  issue 
with  them,  and  we  cannot  compromise  our  principles  by 
speaking  and  acting  as  though  their  denial  of  our  position 
\vas  as  truly  right  as  our  affirmation;  an  affirmation,  be 
it  observed,  to  which  we  are  bound  by  written  obligation 
in  the  formularies  of  our  Church,  and  our  assent  thereto  by 
— 5 


/pledge,  and  promise,  and  vow  under  the  most  solemn 
•"sanctions  known  to  mankind.  The  question  is  not  one  of 
social  relation,  or  civil  recognition,  or  kindly  intercourse 
in  the  walks  of  daily  life,  but  it  is  an  issue  of  fidelity,  as  it 
~^eems  to  me,  to  honor  and  truth. 

Were  we  at  war  with  several  foreign  nations  for  causes 
universally  understood,  it  might  be  considered  a  little  dis- 
couraging, if  one,  who  was  nominated  as  a  general  in  our 
army,  was  urged  upon  those  in  authority  for  confirmation 
with  unanimous  voice  by  our  foes,  and  with  the  plea  that  he 
was  just  the  man  for  the  place,  because  he  habitually  made 
4ight  of  the  issues  at  stake,  or  treated  them  as  matters  of 
supreme  indifference,  and  was  ready  to  concede  everything 
to  them,  our  public  enemies.  It  would  be  more  than  dis- 
couraging if  it  were  found  that  those  with  whom  the 
responsibility  rested  of  giving  or  withholding  appointment 
yielded  apparently  to  the  pressure,  and  said,  after  the  case 
was  fully  presented  to  them,  "it  is  our  pleasure  to  give 
him  a  share  of  the  command  of  our  armies.  Let  him  be 
one  of  our  generals."  The  exhibit  presented  above  is  sad 
beyond  expression  to  those  who  hold  as  a  religious  belief 
what  the  Church  teaches  in  her  creed,  her  ordinal,  her 
offices  and  her  articles.  Two  plus  two  cannot  be  three 
and  four  and  five.  They  are  four,  and  he  who  says  it 
is  a  matter  indifferent  whether  you  reckon  the  amount 
as  three  or  four  or  five,  is  a  traitor  to  mathematical  truth. 
The  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  and  its  denial,  the  polity  of  the 
Church  as  set  forth  in  the  Ordinal,  and  its  repudiation,  the 
natural  depravity  of  man,  as  taught  by  the  Baptismal  Office, 
and  the  Catechism,  and  the  Articles,  and  the  antagonistic 


67 

view,  these  opposite  teachings  cannot  be  held  by  the  same 
persons  at  the  same  time  as  truths.  Et  is  impossible  for  them 
to  tolerate  each  other.  To  play  fast  and  loose  with  the  doc- 
trine of  the  Trinity  and  the  threefold  ministry  and  original 
sin,  to  act  and  speak  as  though  they  were  matters  indiffer- 
ent whether  one  held  them  as  truths,  or  rejected  them  as 
errors  will  do  for  an  infidel,  but 'it  will  nob  do  for  a  dea- 
con, priest  or  bishop  in  the  Church  of  God.  He  is  under 
bonds  to  hold  them  and  teach  them.  He  obtained  his 
status  as  a  Minister  of  Christ  in  the  Church  by  making  the 
pledge  that  he  would  hold  and  teach  them.  They  are  cen- 
tral fundamental  principles  in  the  economy  of  the  Church, 
and  cannot  be  regarded  as  secondary  matters,  or  matters 
indifferent.  He  cannot  escape  by  asserting  that  he  consid- 
ers them  as  non-essential,  since  their  relative  importance  is 
not  left  for  him  to  decide.  The  Church  pronounces  them  to 
be  fundamental,  and  exacts  this  acknowledgment  from 
every  one  whom  she  admits  to  teach  under  her  authority 
and  in  her  name.  He  therefore,  who  repudiates  this  obli- 
gation judges  himself,  and  mankind  will  judge  him.  The 
shouts  of  praise,  and  the  din  of  laudatory  voices  may  seem 
for  a  time  to  prevail,  but  the  silent  thought  of  the  breast 
as  it  grasps  the  relation  of  such  a  man  to  the  Book  of 
Common  Prayer,  and  his  obligations  as  a  clergyman  and 
his  oath  as  a  Bishop,  anticipates  in  condemnation  the 
just  judgment  of  God. 


APPENDIX  VI. 


PELAGIANISM. 

The  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  seems  to  ,be,  as  far  as  I  can 
gather  from  his  public  utterances,  a  Pelagian.  Pelagianism 
I  need  not  say  is  directly  in  conflict  with  the  teaching  of 
Holy  Scripture  and  of  the  Church.  St.  Augustine's  Anti- 
pelagian  writings  have  made  Western  Christendom  familiar 
with  the  heresy  and  supply  its  antidote.  Pelagianism  is 
absolutely  irreconcilable  with  the  teaching  of  our  Book  of 
Common  Prayer.  The  following  passage  represents  much  of 
the  teaching  of  the  Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  which  I  have 
read.  It  embodies  its  spirit.  In  a  volume  entitled  "Twenty 
Sermons,"  New  York,  1890,  Sermon  3d,  p.  46,  occurs  this 
statement.  "I  cannot  think,  I  will  not  think  about  the 
Christian  Church  as  if  it  were  a  selection  out  of  humanity. 
In  its  idea  it  is  humanity.  The  hard,  iron  faced  man,  whom 
I  meet  upon  the  street,  the  degraded  sad  faced  man,  who 
goes  to  prison,  the  weak  silly  faced  man,  who  haunts  so- 
ciety, the  discouraged,  sad  faced  man,  who  drags  the  chain 
of  drudgery,  they  are  all  members  of  the  Church,  members 
of  Christ,  children  of  God,  heirs  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven. 
Their  birth  made  them  so.  Their  baptism  declared  the 
truth,  which  their  birth  made  true.  It  is  impossible  to  es- 


69 

timate  their  lives  aright,  unless  we  give  this  truth  concern- 
ing them  the  first  importance. 

1.  The  writer  seems  to  have   made   up   his   mind   upon 
this  subject,  and  avows  his  belief  as  a  fixed  and  unalter- 
able  conviction.    I   cannot   think,"    he   says,  "/  will  not 
think."    This  assertion  reminds  one  of  St.  Thomas  in  his 
state   of   doubt   when   he   declares,  "Except  I  shall  see  in 
His  hands  the  print  of  the  nails,. etc.,  /  will  not  believe." 
St.  John  xx  25.) 

2.  His  view  of  the  Church  flatly  contradicts  our  Lord's 
description  of  the  Church  in  the  name  which  He  gives  to  it, 
"ecclesia,"  "a  selection."    "On  this  rock,"  He  says,  "I  will 
build  My  Church  (ecclesia)  and  the  gates  of  hell,  etc.,"  (St. 
Matt,  xvi  18)  and  in  His   teaching   respecting   it  directly 
and   by   parable.     One   becomes   accustomed   to    what   is 
shocking  to  the  moral  and  religious  sense.  I  remember  on  one 
occasion  being  filled  with  horror,  when  a  woman  no  longer 
young,  and  thoroughly  hardened  in  her  prejudices,  was  con- 
versing with  me,  and  raising  objections   to   the  use  of  un- 
leavened bread  in  the  Holy  Eucharist.    I  sought  to  answer 
her  arguments  and  satisfy  her  doubts,  and  finally  I  told 
her  that  it  amounted  almost  to  a  demonstration,  as  we 
read  the  Gospel  narrative  that  our  Saviour  instituted  the 
sacrament  in  the   use  of  unleavened  bread.    "Well! "  said 
she  in  reply,  "if  He  did,  He  was  wrong."    I  left  her  house 
in  consternation,  I  was  fearful  lest  it  might  fall  upon  me, 
Alas!    Now  a  school  of  teaching  has  crept  into  the  church 
which  does  not  hesitate  to  assert  that  our  Lord,  as  touch- 
ing his  humanity,  is  full  of  errors.    No  far  reaching  analysis 
is  needed  to  bring  this  awful  impiety  face  to  face  with  bald 


70 

Nestorianism.  It  involves  a  denial  of  the  hypostatic  union 
of  the  two  perfect  natures  in  the  one  divine  Person,  and 
resolves  the  uatures  into  two  independent  personalities. 
Alas!  that  one  should  be  admitted  into  the  Episcopal 
office  by  the  suffrages  of  my  brethren,  not  by  the  edict  of 
the  state,  who  seems  flatly  and  directly  to  contradict  the 
adorable  Lord  Himself. 

The  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  asserts  that  birth  makes 
men  members  of  Christ,  children  of  God  and  heirs  of  the 
kingdom  of  heaven,  and  that  baptism  simply  proclaims  as 
true  what  birth  has  already  made  true. 

Need  I  remind  any  one  who  is  at  all  acquainted  with  the 
Book  of  Common  Prayer  that  such  teaching  is  in  manifest 
conflict  with  its  letter  and  its  spirit  throughout?  Do  we 
need  examples  of  the  contradiction?  The  Bishop  of  Massa- 
chusetts says  men  are  made  members  of  Christ,  etc.,  by 
natural  birth.  The  Catechism  teaches  the  child  to  say  in 
answer  to  the  question  "Who  gave  you  this  name?  My 
sponsors  in  Baptism:  wherein  I  was  made  a  member  of 
Christ,  the  child  of  God  and  an  inheritor  of  the  kingdom 
of  heaven." 

Again  in  the  office  of  Baptism  the  minister  addresses  the 
congregation  and  beseeches  them  "to  call  upon  God  the 
Father,  through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  that  of  His  bounte- 
ous goodness  He  will  grant  to  the  candidates  for  Baptism 
that  which  by  nature  they  cannot  have;  that  they  may  be 
baptized  with  water,  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  received  into 
Christ's  holy  Church,  and  be  made  lively  members  of  the 
same."  In  the  Confirmation  office  the  Bishop  in  his  prayer 
to  God  says,  as  taught  by  the  Church,  "Almighty  and  ever- 


71 

lasting  God  who  hast  vouchsafed  to  regenerate  these  Thy 
servants  by  water  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  etc."  Article  IX 
affirms  "original  sin  standeth  not  in  the  following  of  Adam, 
(as  the  Pelagians  do  vainly  talk)  but  it  is  the  fault  and 
corruption  of  every  man  that  naturally  is  engendered  of 
the  offspring  of  Adam,  whereby  man  is  very  far  gone  from 
original  righteousness,  and  is  of  his  own  nature  inclined  to 
evil,  so  that  the  flesh  lusteth  always  contrary  to  the  spirit, 
and  therefore  in  every  person  born  into  this  world  it  de- 
'serveth  God's  wrath  and  damnation.''  The  Psalmist  de- 
clares (Psalm  51st  5)  "Behold  I  was  shapen  in  wickedness 
and  in  sin  hath  my  mother  conceived  me."  Is  it  necessary 
to  multiply  quotations  from  God's  word  and  the  Prayer 
Book? 

I  am  quite  well  aware  that  such  teaching  as  the  above 
has  not  been  unknown  in  our  communion.  Notably  we 
find  it  in  a  sermon  of  the  brilliant  and  tenderhearted  Rev. 
Frederick  W.  Robertson  of  the  English  Church.  The  influ- 
ence of  the  author  is  deservedly  so  great,  that  it  is  worth 
while  to  say  a  few  words  to  expose  the  error  into  which 
he  unwittingly  fell.  Robertson  claims  that  the  view,  which 
makes  Baptism  the  new  or  second  birth,  reduces  the  sac- 
rament to  "magic."  He  forgets  that  Christ,  the  Eternal 
Son  of  God,  i.3  behind  the  sacraments;  men,  possibly 
devils,  are  behind  magic.  He  forgets  that  to  refuse  the 
sacraments  of  the  Gospel  as  means  of  grace,  because  they 
involve  the  employment  of  a  material  agent  is  to  reject 
the  miracles  of  our  Lord  for  the  same  reason.  To  say 
that  the  Catholic  doctrine  of  the  sacraments  is  "material- 
ism of  the  grossest  kind"  is  of  necessity  to  make  the  same 


72 

charge  against  the  incarnation  of  Jesus  Christ,  since  in  the 
taking  flesh,  God  employed  matter  as  the  instrument 
whereby  He  revealed  Himself  to  mankind,  and  became  the 
Saviour  of  the  race  by  shedding  His  precious  blood  upon  the 
cross.  The  Eternal  "Word  was  made  FLESH,  and  dwelt 
among  us,"  (St.  John,  i:  14,)  is  the  statement  which  an- 
nounces the  law  of  the  incarnation,  the  employment  of 
matter  as  an  instrument  by  the  infinite  God  to  confer  the 
greatest  of  all  blessings  even  Himself  as  part  and  parcel 
of  humanity  upon  mankind.  The  law  of  the  Head  is  the 
law  of  the  members,  the  law  of  Christ  incarnate  is  the  law 
of  His  Church,  His  Body.  He  was  behind  His  miracles, 
He  is  behind  His  sacraments.  In  both  cases  alike  He  em- 
ploys material  agencies,  water-pots  full  of  water,  clay  and 
spittle,  the  spoken  word  in  the  former,  miracles;  water,  bread 
and  wine  in  the  latter,  sacraments.  There  is  no  more  materi- 
alism in  the  one  case  than  in  the  other.  To  say  that  the 
sacraments  as  interpreted  by  the  Church  Catholic  are  magic, 
and  that  the  miracles  are  not,  is  to  confuse  thought,  and  im- 
pose (of  course  riot  intentionally)  upon  the  people  with  spe- 
cious sophistry.  Let  me  say  that  it  would  be  worth  the  while 
of  these  persons,  who  are  always  crying  out  "materialistic, 
gross  materialism,''  to  name  a  single  blessing  which  man 
has  ever  enjoyed,  or  does  enjoy  in  this  life,  which  does  not 
come  to  him  through  the  agency  of  matter.  There  may  be 
such,  but  as  yet  I  do  not  know  of  any.  The  greatest, 
highest  blessing,  Jesus  Christ,  comes  to  me  through  mat- 
ter, and  the  lowest,  in  the  sphere  of  the  supply  of  mere 
bodily  wants,  comes  to  me  through  matter,  and  all,  so  far 
as  I  kn/jw  that  lie  between,  come  to  me  along  the  same 


73 

path  ;  matter  is  employed  in  their  conveyance  by  Him  "from 
Whom  cometh  every  good  and  perfect  gift." 

The  illustration  which  the  gentle  and  affectionate  Rob- 
ertson gave  to  enforce  his  view  of  Baptism  is  entirely  mis- 
leading, unquestionably  it  deceived  him.  He  likens  the 
candidate  for  Holy  Baptism  to  the  heir  to  the  throne,  and 
urges  that  as  coronation  is  said  to  crown  or  make  the 
King  or  Queen,  although  it  simply  proclaims  a  fact  which 
was  already  a  fact,  so  baptism  simply  solemnly  publishes 
a  truth,  which  was  already  made  a  truth  by  nature.  The 
illustration  is  specious,  but  it  is  utterly  fallacious.  In  the 
first  place  it  is  not  said  either  legally  or  historically  that 
coronation  makes  the  sovereign.  Reigns  are  not  dated 
from  the  act  of  coronation,  but  from  the  accession.  In  the 
next  place  the  cases  are  not  parallel,  they  are  separated 
by  the  very  question  in  dispute  between  Pelagius  and  the 
Catholic  Church.  The  English  constitution  designates  the 
heir  to  the  throne  by  criteria,  which  natural  birth  alone 
can  meet,  and  hence  natural  birth  makes  the  sovereign, 
presumptively  while  he  is  the  Heir  Apparent,  and  actually, 
the  moment  his  predecessor  dies. 

God's  Constitution,  the  Bible,  reveals  man's  state  by  na- 
ture, and  the  authorized  interpreter  of  Holy  Scripture,  the 
Catholic  Church,  not  only  fails  to  find  in  it  that  man  is 
by  natural  birth  the  heir  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  but 
teaches  just  the  contrary,  when  she  says  in  her  Catechism 
in  response  to  the  question,  "What  is  the  inward  and 
spiritual  grace  of  Baptism?"  "A  death  unto  sin,  and  a 
new  birth  unto  righteousness ;  for  being  by  nature  born  in 
sin  find  the  children  of  wrath,  we  are  hereby  made  the 


74 

children  of  grace."  The  Rev.  F.  W.  Robertson  and  those 
who  agree  with  him  may  be  right  on  this  point  with  Pe- 
lagius,  but  their  position  is  not  tenable  in  the  Catholic 
Church,  if  she  speaks  her  mind  in  the  General  Councils, 
and  the  authoritative  teaching  of  her  formularies. 

Pelagius  taught  or  is  held  responsible  for  teaching,  that 
the  incarnation,  our  Lord's  birth  into  this  world,  conferred 
divine  sonship  upon  all  mankind  alike,  made  all  men  ac- 
tually "the  children  of  God,  members  of  Christ,  and  heirs 
of  the  kingdom  of  heaven."  The  Church  teaches  that  the 
incarnation  makes  it  possible  for  all  men  to  be  saved,  puts 
it  within  their  power  to  become  by  regeneration  the  chil- 
dren of  Xjod,  members  of  Christ,  and  heirs  of  the  kingdom 
of  heaven.  Here  again  the  issue  is,  not  whether  Pelagius 
and  those  who  accept  his  teaching  are  right  or  wrong, 
but  whether  as  holding  what  the  Church  rejects  and  con- 
demns they  have  a  moral  right  to  represent  her  at  the 
font  and  the  altar,  in  the  pulpit  and  the  bishop's  chair. 

The  question  is  whether  a  man  who  has  twice  signed  the 
following  declaration  just  before  he  was  admitted  to  the 
Diaconate,  and  just  before  he  was  admitted  to  the  Presby- 
terate,  and  practically  repudiated  it  throughout  his  entire 
ministry  of  many  years,  in  word  and  deed,  and  published 
utterances  will  be  likely  to  keep  the  same  declaration  on 
his  admission  to  the  Episcopate,  even  though  that  declar- 
ation be  thrown  into  the  form  of  a  promise  of  conformity, 
and  be  required  of  him  under  the  sanction  of  an  oath. 

This  is  the  declaration  required  by  the  7th  Article  of  the 
Constitution  of  our  Church  to  be  subscribed  by  every  per- 


75 

son,  who  is  admitted  to  Holy  Orders.  "I  do  believe  the 
Holy  Scriptures  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament  to  be  the 
Word  of  God,  and  to  contain  all  things  necessary  to  sal- 
vation, and  I  do  solemnly  engage  to  conform  to  the  Doc- 
trines and  Worship  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in 
the  United  States." 

This  seems  to  be  explicit  enough  and  solemn  enough  to 
bind  the  conscience  of  any  one  in  a  normal  moral  condition. 
But  when  one  conies  to  be  consecrated  a  Bishop  the  same 
declaration  substantially  is  required  of  him  as  a  promise 
of  conformity  to  the  Doctrine,  Discipline,  and  Worship  of 
the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church,  uttered  by  him  in  the 
hearing  of  the  congregation,  and  standing  before  the  altar 
of  his  God.  The  promise  is  exacted  under  the  sanction  of 
an  oath,  and  is  as  follows:  "In  the  name  of  God,  Amen. 

I ,  chosen  Bishop  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church 

in — ,  do  promise  conformity  and  obedience  to  the 

Doctrine,  Discipline,  and  Worship  of  the  Protestant  Epis- 
copal Church  in  the  United  States  of  America.  So  help  me 
God  through  Jesus  Christ." 

The  excuse  made  for  the  man  who  has  exercised  the  lower 
ministries  of  the  Church  in  notorious  violation  of  his  twice 
signed  declaration,  when  he  is  urged  upon  the  Church  for  a 
share  in  the  highest  ministry,  and  he  comes  to  repeat  his 
declaration  in  the  form  of  a  public  verbal  promise,  and  un- 
der the  sanction  of  an  oath,  the  excuse  is  made  for  him 
when  apprehension  is  expressed  that  the  same  anomia  will 
be  exhibited  by  him  in  the  Episcopate  as  in  the  Presbyter- 
ate,  and  that  he  will  be  as  reckless  of  the  obligation  of  his 


76 

Bishop's  oath,  as  he  was  and  continued  to  be  of  the  declar- 
ation, which  held  him  by  his  own  signature  twice  affixed, 
"O,  he  means  well,  he  cannot  understand  theological  distinc- 
tions, and  hence  he  contradicts  the  Church  in  his  teaching 
and  conduct  without  knowing  that  he  is  doing  so."  This 
might  be  an  excuse  to  be  urged  in  palliation  of  his  guilt,  if 
he  were  convicted  of  heresy,  but  we  ask  is  such  a  state- 
ment to  be  accepted  as  a  reason  for  allowing  a  man  to 
be  promoted,  when  it  is  known  that  in  accordance  with 
the  safe-guards,  which  the  Church  hath  interposed  to 
protect  her  from  false  teachers  he  ought  to  be  kept  out? 
Would  such  a  course  be  pursued  in  admitting  surgeons 
to  hospitals,  lawyers  to  the  bench,  pharmacists  to  drug 
stores,  engineers  to  take  charge  of  engines?  Would  natural 
defect  be  pleaded  in  any  of  these  or  like  cases  as  a 
reason  why  mcompetenc}7  should  be  discounted  or  dis- 
regarded altogether  and  a  man  allowed  to  take  charge 
of  interests,  which  he  was  by  nature  disqualified  from  ad- 
ministering? Never.  Men  are  too  careful  of  their  precious 
lives  and  worldly  interests  to  run  such  risks  for  a  single  in- 
stant. What  are  we  to  say  then  of  Bishops,  who  have  in 
their  custody  the  eternal  interests  of  mankind?  Of  course 
the  reply  may  be  made  that  the  Bishops,  who  said  "aye" 
are  satisfied  in  their  own  minds  that  the  teaching  of  the 
one  whom  they  confirm  is  as  good  if  not  better  than  that 
of  the  Church  of  God.  When  this  explanation  is  accepted, 
it  follows  that  the  Episcopate  of  the  Church  in  the  United 
States  by  a  majority  of  their  votes  declare  that  the  faith 
and  discipline  of  the  Church  as  embodied  in  her  creed r 


77 

offices,  articles,  constitution  and  canons  are  matters  indiffer- 
ent, which  anyone  may  hold  or  repudiate  as  he  pleases. 
Observe  I  am  not  speaking  of  issues  which  divide  the  mem- 
bers of  the  church  into  schools  or  parties,  but  of  questions 
which  mark  off  the  Church  from  infidelity,  agnosticism  and 
atheism. 


APPENDIX  VII. 


ARIANISM. 

The  revelation  made  by  the  following  letters  is  sad  in  the 
extreme,  and  force  me  to  ask  and  press  home  the  question, 
what  do  my  brother  Bishops  mean,  who  gave  their  con- 
sent to  the  consecration  of  the  Bishop  of  Massachusetts 
without  any  public  explanation  or  retraction  on  his  part? 

Am  I  to  understand  that  in  their  judgment  a  practical 
denial  of  the  essential  divinity  of  the  Person  of  Jesus  Christ 
is  no  longer  a  bar  to  admission  to  the  Episcopal  office? 
If  their  affirmative  votes  "let  him  be  a  Bishop5'  mean  any- 
thing, they  mean  just  that. 

The  letters  which  follow  disclose  a  state  of  things  which 
fills  me  with  dismay.  It  would  seem  that  the  Rector  of 
Trinity  Church,  Boston,  had  been  in  the  habit  of  giving  a 
general  invitation  in  some  way  of  his  own  devising,  to  the 
congregation  to  receive  the  Holy  Communion,  over  and 
above  the  forms  which  convey  the  Church's  invitation,  and 
that  Unitarians,  known  to  be  such,  were  accustomed  to 
commune  in  Trinity  Church,  and  members  of  Trinity 
Church  often  commumed  in  Unitarian  Churches.  Now,  con- 
sider what  these  facts  compel  us  to  conclude: 

First.  That  the  Rector  of  Trinity j  Church,  Boston,  did 
not,  and,  so  far  as  we  know,  does  not  now  believe  that  in 
Personality,  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  very  and  eternal  God, 


79 

of  one  substance  with  the  Father,  eternal  in  being;,  since 
this  article  of  the  faith  the  Unitarian  denies.  It  matters 
not  where  he  places  the  Saviour,  whether  at  the  apex  of 
creation,  or  on  a  level  with  mankind,  the  interval  between 
the  highest  and  the  lowest  grade  of  creation,  is  as  nothing 
compared  to  the  infinite  abyss  between  the  uncreated  and 
the  created,  and  the  Arian  of  whatever  type  sinks  the 
eternal  Son  of  God  by  an  infinite  degradation  from  the  un- 
created essence  of  the  Divine  Personality  to  the  condi- 
tion of  created  life.  It  is  inconceivable  to  me  that  any  one, 
who  holds  the  essential  divinity  of  our  Saviour,  could  ex- 
pose Him  to  such  intolerable  insult,  and  that  too  in  viola- 
tion of  ordination  vows  and  the  law  of  the  Church  univer- 
sal, and  the  whole  structure  and  spirit  of  the  liturgy,  and  the 
creed,  placed  as  a  bar  to  protect  the  sacrament  from  such 
profanation.  He  who  does  this  thing  must  be  himself  an 
Arian.  Charity  constrains  one  to  resort  to  this  explana- 
tion. 

On  the  other  hand,  in  the  view  of  the  Unitarian,  he  who 
believes  that  our  Lord  is  the  very  and  eternal  God,  and 
pays  Him,  as  he  must,  the  honor  due  to  His  divinity,  is 
an  idolater.  How,  then,  can  the  Unitarian  admit  him  to 
his  assemblies,  and  allow  him  to  join  with  him  in  his  most 
solemn  service  and  most  sacred  act?  The  Apostle  asks, 
and  I  ask,  "What  part  hath  he  that  believeth  with  an  in- 
fidel? And  what  agreement  hath  the  temple  of  God  with 
idols?  (2  Cor.  vi:  15-16). 

Second.  It  appears  on  the  occasion  of  the  consecration 
of  Trinity  Church,  Boston,  in  1877,  on  the  testimony  of 
the  Rev,  Dr.  E.  E.  Hale,  Dr.  Brooks  was  responsible  for  the 


80 

invitation  given  to  him  and  other  Unitarian  ministers  to 
remain  and  receive  the  Holy  Communion,  and  he  explains 
by  a  special  message  why  what  appears  to  have  been  his 
usual  unauthorized  and  personal  invitation  was  not  ex- 
tended. 

It  is  to  be  regretted  that  the  attempt  has  been  made  to 
throw  the  responsibility  of  this  transaction  upon  one  who 
is  dead.  Even  if  it  were  true  that  Bishop  Paddock  did  in 
some  way  seek  to  break  the  force  of  the  righteous  indigna- 
tion and  distress,  which  were  felt  in  consequence  of  the 
champions  of  heresy,  as  the  Church  accounts  heresy,  being 
publicly  received  ar>  such  to  the  Holy  Communion,  still,  so 
far  as  it  appears,  the  invitation  did  not  come  from  him, 
but  on  this  occasion  by  a  special  messenger  from  the 
Rector.  Moreover,  this  receiving  Unitarians  to  the  Holy 
Communion  was  not  an  exception  to  the  practice  of  the 
Rector  of  Trinity  Church,  Boston,  it  was  his  habitual 
practice,  and,  so  far  as  we  know,  is  still. 

Third.  The  Rev.  Dr.  E.  E.  Hale  is  in  error  about  the 
case  of  the  Rev.  Vance  Smith  being  invited  by  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury  to  receive  the  Holy  Communion. 
This  was  not  the  case  at  all.  Directly  the  reverse  was  the 
fact,  as  the  following  succinct  and  emphatic  statement  of 
the  Archbishop  proves: 

Letter  of  the  Archbishop  to  Canon  Carter,  relative  to 
the  case  of  the  Rev.  Vance  Smith: 

ill  confess  that  I  do  not  understand  the  frame  of  mind 
that  would  lead  a  teacher  of  religion  to  protest  against 
the  Nicene  Creed,  and  at  the  same  time  to  join  in  a  solemn 
service  of  which  that  Creed  and  its  doctrines  form  from 


81 

the  beginning  to  the  end  so  prominent  a  part.  Neither 
can  I  understand  any  one  feeling  it  right  to  invite  to  our 
Communion  Service  a  teacher  of  the  Unitarian  body  which, 
so  protests."  Life  of  Archbishop  Tait,  Vol.  2,  p.  70. 

With  these  sentiments  of  the  late  Archbishop  Tait,  I  am.) 
in  full  and  hearty  accord. 

It  must  be  recollected,  too,  that  in  the  first  instance 
even  the  Dean  of  Westminister,  Dr.  (Stanley,  was  not  re- 
sponsible for  the  Kev.  Vance  Smith's  communicating  in 
the  Abbey  beyond  allowing  its  use  for  the  purpose  of  a 
celebration  by  the  Company  of  revisers.  This  Company 
included,  of  course,  the  Rev.  Vance  Smith,  and  the  invita- 
tion went  to  him  as  to  every  other  member  to  attend.  He 
was  thrown  upon  his  own  responsibility,  and  the  Arch- 
bishop very  justly  criticises  his  conduct  in  meeting  that  re- 
sponsibility. It  is  true  Dean  Stanley  espaused  the  cause 
of  the  Rev.  Vance  Smith,  and  the  judgment  of  the  Upper 
House  of  Convocation  of  the  Province  of  Canterbury  was 
pronounced  in  a  resolution  passed  by  a  vote  of  10  to  4, 
on  the  question  of  his  presence  among  the  revisers,  as 
follows : 

"That  it  is  the  judgment  of  this  House  that  no  person 
who  denies  the  Godhead  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  ought 
to  be  invited  to  join  either  Company  to  which  is  commit- 
ted the  revision  of  the  Authorized  Version  of  Holy  Script- 
ure, and  that  any  such  person  now  on  either  Company 
should  cease  to  act  therewith." 

Fourth.    With  the  view,  which  the  Rev.  Dr.   E.  E.  Hale 
takes  of  the  Lord's  Supper,  and  his  illustration  of  a  feast 
—6 


82 

;<given  by  the  City  of  Boston,  I  have  nothing  to  do.  He 
%as  a  perfect  right  to  hold  such  opinions,  and  I  am  ready 
to  protect  him  in'  the  exercise  of  that  right .  But  it  must 
be  manifest  to  all  that  such  a  view  is  absolutely  and  hope- 
lessly irreconcilable  with  the  teaching  of  the  Book  of  Com- 
mon Prayer  and  the  Ancient  Liturgies. 

You  cannot,  with  any  scheme  of  comprehension,  without 
•doing  violence  to  reason,  and  honesty  and  the  moral 
sense,  bring  together  and  unite  in  the  worship  of  God  the 
Unitarian  and  the  Trinitarian.  The  point  at  issue  involves 
the  truth  of  truths,  the  verity  of  verities,  the  doctrine  of 
^doctrines.  In  the  view  of  the  Unitarian,  he  who  acknowl- 
edges the  Son  to  be  of  the  same  substance  with  the  Father, 
and  consequently  possessing  all  the  attributes  of  the  Father, 
and  who  worships  Him  as  God,  must  be  an  idolater.  The 
Rev.  Dr.  E.  E.  Hale  must  regard  me  as  such,  his  doing  so 
is  an  inevitable  logical  consequence  of  hfs  estimate  of  our 
Lord,  he  cannot  help  it,  and  I  do  not  find  the  least  fault 
for  his  so  thinking  of  me.  I  should  cease  to  respect  him,  if 
he  treated  the  fundamental  verity  of  religion  as  a  matter 
of  supreme  indifference. 

On  the  other  hand  the  Trinitarian  must,  as  a  logical 
necessity,  regard  the  Unitarian,  in  so  far  as  he  fails  /to 
acknowledge  the  Catholic  Faith,  as  an  unbeliever.  It  is 
impossible  that  it  should  or  could  be  otherwise.  I  beg  to 
say,  therefore,  in  all  that  I  have  written  or  may  write,  I 
do  not  mean  to  be  understood  as  expressing  the  slightest 
feeling  of  disrespect  or  unkindness.  I  see  how  I  must  ap- 
pear in  their  eyes,  I  know  how  they  appear  in  mine.  The 
only  parties  with  whom  I  mnst  part  company  are  those 


83 

who  are  false  to  their  principles  and  their  duty  as  em- 
bodied in  the  vows,  which  bind  them,  and  the  laws  which 
they  have  sworn  to  obey.  When  one  thinks  of  such  men 
he  responds  with  all  his  heart  to  the  sentiment  of  old 
Homer,  when  the  race  was  young  and  its  sensitiveness  to 
truth  was  not  blunted  by  many  inventions,  which  men 
have  found  out  in  their  ingenious  "interpretations." 

"Who  dares  think  one  thing  and  another  tell, 
My  soul  detests  him  as  the  gates  of  hell." 

What  is  the  present  age  mad  upon  doing?  To  compre- 
hend and  reconcile  irreconcilables,  to  unite  and  wed  incom- 
patibilities, and  what  will  be  the  net  result?  The  loss  of 
truth,  the  depraving  of  the  moral  sense,  the  degradation 
of  manhood.  Let  us  see.  Here  is  a  man  who  holds  the 
truth,  but  he  holds  it  with  a  feeble  grasp.  He  will  not 
suffer  for  it,  and  he  is  ready  to  barter  it  for  a  price. 
He  knows  that  two  plus  two  make  four.  This  is  the 
truth.  On  his  right  is  one  who  affirms  that  two  plus  two 
make  five,  and  on  his  left  is  one  who  urges  two  plus  two 
make  three.  He  knows  full  well  that  two  plus  two  do  not 
make  either  five  or  three,  but  the  age  demands  chanty,  as 
it  calls  falsehood  and  dishonesty,  and  so  there  comes  a 
clever  logician  with  a  scheme  of  comprehension  and  his 
proposition  is  that  two  plus  two  make  an  amount  not 
less  than  three  nor  more  than  five,  and  then  they  all  sit 
down  in  a  symposium  of  love  and  agreement,  and  hence- 
forth arithmetic  is  taught  on  this  basis.  What  a  harvest 
of  good  fruits  this  comprehensive  unity  in  the  realm  of 
figures  would  produce  in  the  world  of  business. 


84 

So  in  the  sphere  of  Christianity,  break  down  the  metes 
and  bounds  of  truth,  make  everything  from  the  being  of 
God  to  the  condition  of  man  and  the  terms  of  redemption 
matters  of  indifference,  let  them  stand  for  three  or  four,  or 
five  as  you  please,  so  long  as  you  are  good  natured  and 
are  liberal  and  popular.  What  is  left?  Nothing.  Nothing, 
the  incarnate  God  is  gone,  and  His  Church  and  salvation. 
Forbid  it  Almighty  God. 


[From  the  Christian  Register,  Boston,  Saturday,  March  17,  1877.} 
THE  COMMUNION  SERVICE. 

To  the  Editor  of  the  Christian  Register: 

"I  happened  to  be  one  of  many  Unitarians  who  partook 
of  the.  Lord's  Supper  at  Trinity  church  on  the  day  of  dedi- 
cation. It  seemed  to  me  a  personal  matter,  and  a  very 
simple  matter,  by  no  means  worthy  of  the  attention  which 
the  press  has  given  to  it.  There  is  probably  always  a  con- 
siderable number  of  Unitarians  who  partake  of  the  Lord's 
Supper  whenever  it  is  administered  at  Trinity  Church ;  and, 
on  the  other  hand,  it  is  probable  that  many  Episcopalians 
partake  of  it  whenever  it  is  administered  in  any  large 
Unitarian  church  in  this  city. 

Neither  the  Unitarian  Church  nor  the  Episcopal  Church 
has  ever  been  coy  or  narrow  in  its  invitations  to  it,  and, 
in  practice  each  church  expects  and  wishes  that  all  who 
profess, and  call  themselves  Christians  shall  receive  it. 

It  happens,  however,  that  the  narrowness  expressed  in 
that  absurd  and  contradictory  phrase  "close  communion" 
has  so  far  affected  the  general  sentiment,  that  the  fact  that 


85 

thirty  or  forty  clergymen,  not  Episcopalians,  should  join, 
in  the  service  on  the  day  of  dedication  excited  some  public 
comment.  It  would  be  a  pity  if  any  discussion  on  the  sub- 
ject should  confuse  any  persons  who  are  unwilling  to  make 
the  communion  service  the  emblem  of  disunion;  and  it 
seems  worth  while,  therefore,  to  state  the  principle  on  which 
the  Episcopal  and  Unitarian  churches  give  their  broad  in- 
vitation, and  on  which,  whether  they  gave  it  or  not,  it  is 
fitting  that  Christian  men  and  women  should  habitually 
join  in  the  service. 

The  central  principle  is  that  this  is  the  Lord's  Supper. 
It  is  not  Bishop  Paddock's  supper;  it  is  not  Mr.  Phillips 
Brooks'  supper;  it  is  Jesus  Christ's  table,  spread  for  any 
person  who  cares  for  him  enough  to  wish  to  attend. 

If  the  city  of  Boston  announced  that,  on  a  certain  day, 
it  would  serve  an  entertainment  for  all  the  people  in  Bos- 
ton, on  the  Common,  and  I  wished  to  attend  at  that  en- 
tertainment, being,  as  I  am,  one  of  those  people,  I  should 
attend.  I  should  not  ask  the  mayor  if  I  was  on  his  list, 
or  the  chief  of  police  if  I  was  on  his.  Having  been  invited, 
I  should  go,  and  where  I  found  a  vacant  seat  I  should  sit 
down.  True,  I  was  early  taught,  on  high  authority,  "never 
to  quarrel  with  a  porter;"  and  if  an  ignorant  policeman 
came  to  me,  and  ordered  me  out  I  might  very  possibly  go 
away,  rather  than  have  a  personal  altercation  with  him 
on  an  occasion  of  festivity. 

But  this  is  only  as  a  gentleman,  because  he  is  a  gentle- 
man, often  "abates  something  of  his  right."  I  have  an  en- 
tire right  to  stay — and  my  staying  is  the  thing  of  course; 
my  going  away  would  be  accidental  or  exceptional. 


86 

In  fact,  I  am  a  minister  of  the  gospel,  and  it  has  been 
my  pleasure  to  receive  thousands  of  persons  to  their  first 
communion.  I  dare  not  say  how  often  I  have  told  such 
young  persons  what  I  suppose  to  be  the  statement  well- 
nigh  universal  of  the  church,  that  they  are  to  receive  the 
Lord's  supper  wherever  they  find  it  administered,  "asking 
no  questions  for  conscience  sake."  In  particular,  then,  there 
is  no  reason  why  they  should  ask  the  officiating  clergyman 
whether  they  are  to  partake  or  no.  For,  if  he  is  a  true 
man,  he  knows  that  he  is  simply  the  waiter  on  the  Lord's 
table  on  that  occasion,  sufficiently  honored  indeed  that  he 
is  permitted  to  stand  and  wait  at  such  a  service.  It  m 
Jesus  Christ  who  gave  the  invitation,  and  gave  it  to  all 
of  us ;  to  Thomas  who  doubted ;  to  Peter  who  disowned; 
and  very  likely  to  Judas,  who  betrayed. 

He  asked  me,  though  he  never  commanded  me,  to  join 
in  this  service  when  I  met  with  other  people  who  were  join- 
ing in  it.  With  that  request  of  his,  it  is  a  profound  pleas- 
ure for  me  to  comply,  whenever  I  meet  together  with  such 
people. 

The  true  advice  to  be  given  to  any  communicant  is  to 
join  with  the  Greek  church,  with  the  Koman  church,  though 
it  be  the  first  of  schismatics;  with  the  Episcopal  churchr 
though  with  us  it  stands  in  the  attitude  in  which  a  dis- 
senting church  in  England  stands  toward  that  establish- 
ment, which  is  all  rooted  in  with  English  institutions. 

He  will  join  in  the  communion  with  a  Presbyterian  church » 
not  annoyed  that  more  or  less  is  said  about  persons  in 
regular  standing;  or,  in  one  word,  where  the  Lord's  table 
is  spread,  he  will  remember  who  invited  him  to  it. 


87 

In  reference  to  the  communion  at  Trinity  Church,  more 
.or  less  has  been  said  of  Mr.  Brooke's  invitation  to  the 
clergymen  present.  It  is  perfectly  true  that  one  of  the 
Wardens  came  to  the  several  pews  in  which  the  invited 
clergy,  who  were  not  Episcopalians,  sat,  and  said  it  was 
the  hope  of  the  minister  that  they  would  remain.  He  said 
the  congregation  at  large  was  not  solicited  to  remain  from 
the  simple  imposibility  of  administering  the  communion  at 
one  time  to  so  many.  This  was  a  perfectly  fit  reason  for 
Air.  Brooks's  courtesy,  which  otherwise  would  have  been 
quite  unnecessary.  The  invitation  was  given  eighteen  hun- 
dred years  ago. 

As  to  the  attendance  of  Unitarians  at  the  supper  when 
administered  by  the  Church  of  England,  there  is  no  ques- 
tion whatever  as  to  the  practice;  and  the  practice  in  that 
Church  has  great  weight  in  determining  the  practice  of  the 
Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  America. 

The  service  in  which  Mr.  Vance  [Smith]  partook  of  the 
communion  with  the  other  translators  is  well  remembered. 
But  it  is  idle  to  rest  on  an  incidental  practice,  where  the 
origin  and  principle  of  the  whole  service  indicate  what  is 
the  true  course  for  those  who  are  in  sympathy  with  it." 

E.  E.  HALE. 

[From  the  Boston  Commonwealth,  January  30,  1892,  p.  5.] 
DR.   PADDOCK,   DR.   BROOKS,   AND  DR.   SHATTUCK. 

11 To  the  Editors  of  the  Commonwealth: 

"GENTLEMEN— My  attention  has  been  called  to  a  letter  in 
the  Guardian,  an  Episcopal  paper  published  in  London. 
It  contains  a  communication  from  Mr.  G.  C.  Shattuck,  a 


88 

member  of  the  Standing  Committee  of  the  Diocese  of  Massa- 
chusetts, with  reference  to  the  charge  of  admitting  Unitar- 
ians to  the  Holy  Communion,  often  made  against  Dr. 
Brooks,,  recently  elected  Bishop  of  Massachusetts:  (Dr. 
Shattuck  writes  as  follows.) 

"Trinity  Church  in  Boston  was  consecrated  more  than 
fourteen  years  ago.  On  that  occasion  some  Unitarian 
clergymen  received  the  sacrament,  and  the  attention  of  Dr. 
Paddock  (at  that  time  Bishop)  was  called  to  the  fact  within 
a  few  days  of  the  occurrence.  The  Bishop  replied  that  he 
alone  was  responsible  for  the  service,  Dr.  Brooks,  the  Rec- 
tor, having  no  responsibility.  It  has  always  been  the  cus- 
tom in  Massachusetts  to  adminnister  the  Communion  to 
unknown  persons  apptying  for  it,  they  assuming  their  own 
responsibility.  Neither  the  Bishop  nor  his  assistants  in  ad- 
ministering the  Communion  recognized  any  applying  for  the 
Sacrament  as  Unitarians.  Will  you  allow  me  to  add,  that 
there  is  hardly  a  Bishop  in  this  whole  country  who  enjoys  to 
so  great  an  extent  the  respect  and  admiration  of  both  his 
clergy  and  laity  as  the  present  Bishop  of  Massachusetts." 

I  am  one  of  the  clergymen  referred  to;  and  as  my  name 
and  that  of  Dr.  J.  Freeman  Clarke  have  in  this  connection 
been  alluded  to  in  print,  it  is  proper  that  I  should  publicly 
refer  to  Dr.  Shattuck 's  letter— which  Dr.  Paddock  would 
not  have  printed,  were  he  living. 

The  transaction  was  in  the  highest  degree  courteous  and 
creditable  to  the  clergy  of  the  Episcopal  Church. 

Dr.  Clarke  privately  asked  me  if  I  should  partake  of  the 
Communion  "if  we  were  not  asked".  I  said  to  him  privately, 
that  I  received  my  invitation  eighteen  centuries  and  a  half 


89 

ago  and  should  partake,  unless  I  were  asked  not  to.  He 
said  he  should  also.  A  few  minutes  after,  a  gentleman, 
personally  known  to  us  both,  came  to  each  of  us,  to  say 
that  it  was  the  wish  of  the  gentlemen  who  had  the  service 
in  charge  that  all  the  clergymen  present  should  partake; 
that  the  number  of  persons  present  was  so  large  that  the 
usual  general  invitation  could  not  be  given,  but  that  it 
was  hoped  that  all  the  clergy  would  unite  in  the  service. 
We  did  so,  accordingly  not  as  "unknown  persons  applying 
for  it,"  but  as  persons  well  known  to  the  Bishop  and  his 
clergy.  We  were,  in  fact,  present  only  because  invited. 
Special  seats  were  provided  for  us.  Neither  Bishop  Paddock 
nor  the  Vestry  of  Trinity  Church  would  have  invited  us  to 
the  first  half  of  the  ceremony,  if  they  had  not  expected  us 
to  join  in  the  whole. 

In  truth,  as  Bishop  Paddock  undoubtedly  remembered, 
the  whole  principle  was  settled  for  the  Episcopal  Church, 
when  Archbishop  Tait  invited  to  the  Special  Communion, 
when  the  revision  was  begun,  Dr.  Yance  Smith,  who  sat 
on  the  board  as  the  representative  of  the  Unitarian  Church 
of  England."  Respectfully  yours, 

EDWARD  E.  HALE. 

South  Congregational  Church,  Boston,  Jan.  27,  1892. 


THE  REV.   JAMES  FREEMAN  CLARKE  S    TESTIMONY. 

[From  the  Christian  Register,  March  10,  1877,] 
"As  I  was  one  of  the  liberals  who  accepted  the  personal 
invitation    of  Phillips  Brooks  to  stay    to  the  Communion, 
I  will  venture  to  ask  the  following  question,  etc.,  etc."    The 
italics  are  mine. 


90 

Again  in  the  same  letter  the  Rev.  Mr.  Clarke  writes  as 
follows:  "I  do  not  then  consider  that  the  brethren  who, 
with  myself,  gladly  stood  for  a  moment  in  communion  with 
Phillips  Brooks  and  his  friends  on  this  occasion  sacrificed 
any  principle  in  so  doing.  My  face  was  toward  the  light, 
for  I  saw  in  this  act  of  my  friend  a  faint  gleam  of  the 
rosy  dawn  of  universal  brotherhood  which  is  to  come. 
Phillips  Brooks  and  1  were  moving  in  the  same 
direction,  for  we  were  both  moving  toward  a,  ground  ot 
higher  union  of  spirit  in  which  all  differences  of  the  letter 
disappear."  Italics  mine. 

Why,  I  may  ask,  has  Bishop  Brooks  both  before  and 
since  his  consecration  allowed  his  friends  to  deny  that  he 
ever  invited  Unitarians  and  Unitarian  ministers  as  such  to 
come  to  the  Holy  Communion  when  he  knew  that  they 
were  placing  themselves  in  a  false  position  and  misleading 
others?  Why  should  Bishop  Doane,  who  had  better  facili- 
ties for  knowing  the  facts  than  most  bishops,  if  not  most 
people,  treat  this  fact  in  a  letter  to  an  English  newspaper 
as  though  it  were  in  doubt,  an  allegation? 


APPENDIX  VIII. 


APOSTOLICAL  SUCCESSION. 

The  issue  made  is  not  as  to  the  truth  or  falsehood  of 
the  theory,  but  whether  a  man  who  accepts  Holy  Orders 
in  the  Church  is  at  liberty  to  repudiate  it.  I  am  not  dis- 
cussing the  subject  of  apostolical  succession  on  its  merits 
as  to  its  truth,  but  I  am  insisting  that  the  Church,  the 
Protestant  Episcopal  Church  of  these  United  States,  lays 
down  the  doctrine  of  apostolical  succession  as  the  founda- 
tion principle  of  her  Ordinal,  and  applies  it  in  her  practice 
exclusively  in  admitting  men  to  her  ministry  as  Deacons, 
Priests  and  Bishops. 

It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  adduce  specific  evidence  to 
prove  that  the  Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  while  a  Presbyter, 
repudiated  the  doctrine  of  Apostolical  Succession,  and  the 
ministry  as  constituted  in  three  orders  as  taught  by  the 
Ordinal. 

Aside  from  Bishop  Brooks'  intrinsic  merits,  which  have 
given  him  so  wide  a  reputation  for  eloquence  and  learning,  no 
one  cause  has  contributed  more  to  make  him  the  idol  of  the 
people  than  his  attitude  towards  the  Church  of  which  he  was 
and  is  a  minister.  He  has  treated  with  scorn  and  proud 
contempt  her  ordinal,  her  offices,  her  rubrics,  her  canons 
and  the  spirit  of  divine  worship  as  embodied  in  her  Book  of 


92 

Common  Prayer.  This  attitude  on  the  part  of  one  so  con- 
spicuous in  himself  fascinated  the  crowd.  The  position  is 
so  unique  for  one,  who  is  in  a  system  by  his  own  choice,  and 
yet  in  word  and  deed  repudiates  it,  whose  sympathies  are 
outside  of  his  home,  rather  than  within  it,  and  whose  fol- 
lowing is  largely  made  up  of  the  foes  of  the  Church,  or  of 
those  who  are  indifferent  to  her  claims,  that  it  attracts 
attention,  and  with  a  vast  unthinking  multitude  it  pleases. 
The  popular  delusion  is  that  this  is  liberality.  The  cry 
goes  up,  "the  liberal  soul  deviseth  liberal  things.''  It  needs 
not  very  much  reflection  to  see  that  this  is  not  liberality, 
it  is  disloyality  to  vows  and  promises,  to  what  the  system 
of  which  the  man  who  acts  in  this  way  is  a  teacher  and 
administrator  proposes  to  him  as  truth  and  which  he  has 
accepted  as  truth.  Mind,  Ian  not  saying  that  it  is  truth, 
but  that  he  has  accepted  it  as  truth,  and  stands  before  the 
public  as  its  accredited  Ambassador.  I  am  prepared  to 
hear  it  said,  "other  men  have  done  the  same,  and  their 
names  are  illustrious."  This  may  be,  but  be  they  who  they 
may,  they  were  confessedly,  with  all  their  lustre,  miserable 
sinners,  and  one,  possibly  the  greatest,  of  their  sins,  was 
their  infidelity  to  truth  in  this  respect.  "God  is  no  respecter 
of  persons,"  and  He  teaches  us  that  no  man  can  make  wrong 
right.  It  is  wrong,  cruelly  wrong,  for  any  man  to  get 
into  a  system  by  making  promises,  as  a  condition  antece- 
dent to  his  admission,  and  then  when  he  secures  his  posi- 
tion and  a  consequent  hearing  by  virtue  of  that  position, 
to  turn  around  and  repudiate  his  promises,  pose  before 
the  world  as  better  than  his  system,  and  as  superior  in 
his  personal  character  to  his  official.  Nothing  appears  to 


93 

me  more  unlovely  than  suck  exhibitions,  nothing  can  be 
more  unmanly,  more  foreign  to  true  courage  and  nobility 
of  nature.  I  do  not  say  that  it  is  the  motive,  but  it  is 
the  cheapest  way  of  securing  popularity  and  applause  to 
go  forth  as  the  Apostle  of  liberality,  and  especially  liber- 
ality in  the  case  of  possessions,  which  are  not  your  own. 
A  free  handling  of  the  Word  of  God,  the  Creed  of  Chris- 
tendom, and  the  offices  and  order  of  the  Church  of  Christ, 
will  bring  little  or  no  renown  to  an  Agnostic,  cr  any  man 
who  stands  simply  on>  his  own  platform  and  represents  no 
more  than  himself,  but  when  a  Priest  in  the  Church  of  God 
does  these  things,  he  becomes  at  once  the  darling  of  the 
multitude,  his  temporary  fame  at  least  is  secured. 

I  shall  print  the  preface  to  the  Ordinal  and  some  other 
extracts  from  our  Book  of  Common  Prayer,  and  then  some 
specimens  from  the  public  utterances  of  the  Bishop  of  Mas- 
sachusetts with  which  they  seem  to  be  in  irreconcilable  con- 
flict. 

THE  FORM  AND  MANNER  OF 

MAKING,  OKDAINING,  AND  CONSECRATING 
BISHOPS,  PRIESTS,  AND  DEACONS; 

ACCORDING  TO  THE  ORDER  OF  THE  PROTESTANT  EPISCOPAL  CHURCH 
IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA,  AS  ESTABLISHED  BY  THE 
BISHOPS,  THE  CLERGY,  AND  LAITY  OF  SAID  CHURCH,  IN  GENERAL 
CONVENTION,  IN  THE  MONTH  OF  SEPTEMBER,  A.  D.  1792. 


TT  is  evident  unto  all  men,  diligently  reading  Holy  Scripture  and  ancient 
Authors,  that  from  the  Apostles'1  time  there  have  been  these  Orders  of 
Ministers  in  Christ's  Church, — Bishops,  Priests,  and  Deacons.  Which  Of- 
fices were  evermore  had  in  such,  reverend  Estimation,  that  no  man  might 
presume  to  execute  any  of  them,  except  he  were  first  called,  tried,  examined, 
and  knmcn  to  have  such  qualities  as  are  requisite  for  the  same;  and  also  by 
public  Prayer,  with  Imposition  of  Hands,  were  approved  and  admitted  there- 
unto by  lawful  Authority.  And  therefore,  to  the  intent  that  these  Orders  may 


94 

be  continued,  and  reverently  used  and  esteemed  in  tliix  Church,  no  man  shall 
be  accounted  or  taken  to  be  a  lawful,  Bishop,  Priest,  or  Deacon,  in  this 
Church,  or  suffered  to  execute  any  of  the  said  Functions,  except  he  be  called, 
tried,  examined,  and  admitted  thereunto,  according  to  tJie  Form  hereafter 
folloidng,  or  hath  had  Episcopal  Consecration  or  Ordination. 


From  the  Thirty-nine  Articles. 
AKT.  XXIII.     Of  Ministering  in  the  Congregation. 

IT  is  not  lawful  for  any  man  to  take  upon  him  the  office  of  public 
preaching,  or  ministering  the  Sacraments  in  the  Congregation, 
before  he  is  lawfully  called,  and  sent  to  execute  the  same.  And 
those  we  ought  to  judge  lawfully  called  and  sent,  which  be  chosen 
and  called  to  this  work  by  men  who  have  public  authority  given  un- 
to them  in  the  Congregation,  to  call  and  send  Ministers  into  the 
Lord's  vineyard. 


ART.  XXXIV.    Of  Consecration  of  Bishops  and  Ministers. 

THE  Book  of  Consecration  of  Bishops,  and  Ordering  of  Priests  and 
Deacons,  as  set  forth  by  the  General  Convention  of  this  Church 
in  1792,  doth  contain  all  things  necessary  to  such  Consecration  and 
Ordering:  neither  hath  it  anything  that,  of  itself,  is  superstitious 
and  ungodly.  And,  therefore,  whosoever  are  consecrated  or  ordered 
according  to  said  Form',  we  decree  all  such  to  be  rightly,  orderly, 
and  lawfully  consecrated  and  ordered. 


The  Canons  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  provide, 
Title  1,  Canon  2,  §  VII,  that  a  minister  of  another  denomi- 
nation not  having  Episcopal  ordination  in  order  to  enter 
the  Ministry  must  become  a  Candidate  for  Holy  Orders 
and  be  regarded  as  a  Layman  and  be  ordained. 

Whereas  by  Title  1,  Canons  11  and  12,  it  is  provided  that 
ministers  ordained  by  Bishops  are  not  to  be  ordained,  but 
simply  to  subscribe  the  declaration  contained  in  Article  7 
of  the  Constitution  in  due  and  proper  form  whereupon  they 
are  at  once  accredited  as  ministers  of  this  Church. 

Title  1,  Canon  14  provides  as  follows: 

"No  minister  in  charge  of  any  congregation  of  this 
Church,  or  in  case  of  vacancy  or  absence,  no  churchwar- 


95 

dens,  vestrymen  or  trustees  of  the  congregation  shall  per- 
mit any  person  to  officiate  therein  without  sufficient  evi- 
dence of  his  being  duly  licensed  or  ordained  to  minister  in 
this  Church." 

The  utterances  of  Bishop*  Brooks  are  such  as  follow: 
The  public  has  been  familiar  with  his  position  on  this  sub- 
ject for  many  years.  "There  are  those  that  hold  that 
from  the  time  of  the  Apostles  down  to  our  own  Bishop 
Paddock  of  Massachusetts,  Bishops  have  been  consecrated 
by  Bishops,  by  direct  touch  of  the  hand  upon  the  head; 
that  so  from  generation  to  generation  the  commission  to 
administer  the  Christian  Gospel  has  come  down,  and  that 
now,  in  this  land,  it  belongs  to  no  one  outside  of  that 
succession.  You  know  how  largely  that  theory  prevails, 
and  always  has  prevailed  in  our  Church. 

There  is  no  line  in  the  Prayer  Book,  which  declares  any 
such  theory.  It  has  heretofore  been  a  theory  held  only  by 
individuals.  I  tell  you,  my  friends,  I  never  could  for  a 
single  day  consent  to  that." 

From  a  sermon  of  Bishop  Brooks,  delivered  the  first  Sunday  after 
his  return  from  the  General  Convention  in  the  fall  of  1886. 


UI  do  not  believe  that  the  threefold  organization  of  the 
Christian  Ministry,  or  the  existence  of  the  Episcopate  is 
essential  to  the  being  of  a  Christian  Church." 

From  a  speech  of  Bishop  Brooks  before  the  Church  Congress,  Phil- 
adelphia, November,  1890. 


"If  our  Church  does  especial  work  in  our  country,  it  must 
be  by  the  especial  and  peculiar  way  in  which  she  is  able  to 
bear  that  witness,  not  by  any  fiction  of  an  apostolical 


96 
i 

succession  in  her  ministry,  which  gives  to  them  alone  a, 
right  to  bear  such  witness.  There  is  no  such  peculiar 
privilege  or  commission  belonging  to  her,  or  any  other 
body."  Brooks'  Twenty  Sermons,  p.  56. 

Let  me  say  the  doctrine  of  Apostolical  succession  is  not 
a  theory  held  by  a  few  in  this  or  any  other  age,  it  is  the 
teaching  of  the  One  Holy  Catholic  and  Apostolic  Church  in 
all  ages,  by  all  and  everywhere.  Bishop  Brooks  may  be 
right  in  calling  it  "a  fiction,"  but  the  Church  of  God  has 
held  it  and  taught  it  as  truth  notwithstanding,  and  will 
continue  to  do  so  to  the  end  of  the  world.  Our  own 
Church  is  most  emphatic  in  her  authoritative  declarations 
and  uniform  practice  in  affirming  the  same  doctrine  as 
truth.  If  she  is  not,  then  I  would  ask  any  one  to  tell  us 
in  what  form  of  speech,  and  by  what  course  of  action,  she 
could  do  so  more  clearly  and  decisively  than  she  does  so 
now. 

Moreover,  it  may  be  that  Bishop  Brooks  is  right  and 
the  Catholic  Church  is  wrong,  and  that  apostolical  succes- 
sion is  'a  fiction,"  but  it  is  passing  strange  that  while  all 
nature  cries  out  as  she  continues  her  life  in  plant,  and 
tree,  and  insect,  and  fish,  and  bird,  and  beast,  and  man, 
"this  gift  of  life  comes  to  you  by  succession,"  and  the  elder 
church  affirms  the  same  as  grace  is  transmitted  by  lineal 
succession  in  the  Aaronic  Priesthood,  it  is  passing  strange 
that  the  Christian  Church  should  be  the  one  exception  to 
the  universal  law,  and  that  for  fifteen  hundred  years  she 
should  have  been  in  absolute  ignorance  of  her  anomalous 
position  among  the  living  activities  of  God's  universe,  and 
that  then  the  discovery  should  be  made  in  the  interest  of 


97 

men,  who  would  set  up  for  themselves  and  manufacture  a 
church  as  they  organize  a  club,  and  presume  to  represent 
God  in  official  acts.  This  is  passing  strange. 

Man  can  imitate,  he  can  copy,  so  as  to  deceive  himself," 
so  exquisite  is  his  skill,  but  one  thing  he  cannot  do,  he 
cannot  contribute  the  factor  of  life,  that  comes  from  the 
hand  of  God  alone,  and  ordinarily,  so  far  as  we  know,  by 
succession.  The  grain  of  wheat,  the  product  of  this  year's 
harvest,  descends  to  us  through  a  succession  of  harvests 
from  the  great  original  Life-Giver.  Bishop  Brooks  may  be 
right  with  his  sneers  at  Apostolical  Succession,  but  if  he  is, 
then  the  Catholic  Church  is  no  place  for  him,  since  she 
holds  it,  and  teaches  it  and  makes  it  her  rule  of  practice. 


-7 


APPENDIX  IX. 


"CLOSED  QUESTIONS,"  a  pastoral  letter  addressed  by  the  Bishop  of 
Springfield  to  his  Diocese  on  the  occasion  of  the  McQueary  trial, 
Holy  Week,  1891.  Eeprinted  in  order  to  show  the  moral  obliga- 
tions which  bind  every  man,  Bishop  as  well  as  Priest  and  Deacon, 
who  enters  the  ministry  of  the  Church.  The  Rev.  Mr.  McQueary 
was  a  Presbyter  of  the  Diocese  of  Ohio,  tried,  convicted  and  de- 
posed for  heresy. 


PASTORAL  LETTER. 

• 

Dear  Brethren  of  the  Clergy  and  Laity  of  the  Diocese  of  Springfield : 

The  Church  enjoins  it  upon  her  Bishops  as  a  duty,  from 
time  to  time,  to  address  to  their  flocks  "Pastoral  Letters 
upon  some  points  of  Christian  doctrine,  worship  or  man- 
ners." (Digest,  Title  I,  Canon  16,  §  9,  p.  70.) 

The  course  of  events  in  the  history  of  our  Church  during 
the  past  few  months,  seems  to  suggest  the  propriety  of 
'our  issuing  such  a  Pastoral  Letter  to  you,  our  beloved  in 
the  Lord,  in  order  to  allay  any  doubts  which  may  have 
arisen  in  your  minds,  or  to  quiet  apprehensions  which  may 
naturally  have  been  occasioned  by  the  assaults  which  have 
recently  been  made  upon  the  faith  once  delivered  unto  the 
saints. 

Brethren,  there  are  closed  questions  in  the  Church  of 
God— questions  which  have  been  settled  directly  by  divine 
authority,  or  indirectly  by  the  same  authority  speaking 


99 

through  the  One,  Holy,  Catholic  and  Apostolic  Church. 
These  questions,  which  are  comparatively  few,  relatejto  the 
doctrine,  polity,  sacraments  and  worship  given  by  the 
Apostles  to  the  first  believers  in  Christ  as  the  legacy  be- 
queathed by  the  Master  to  be  received  and  held  and 
guarded  and  handed  on  from  generation  to  generation  to 
the  end  of  the  world. 

From  the  outset  the  matters  embraced  in  these  subjects 
were  to  those,  who  received  them,  beyond  debate,  because 
they  came  to  them  by  inspiration  from  God.  They  be- 
longed to  the  sphere  of  supernatural  knowledge,  about 
which  man  knows  nothing  and  can  know  nothing,  except 
in  so  far  as  God  wills.  St.  Paul  states  this  fact  explicitly 
in  his  letter  to  the  Church  of  Corinth,  (1  Cor.  xv,  3.  4), 
when  he  says:  "For  I  delivered  unto  you  first  of  all  that 
which  I  also  received,  how  that  Christ  died  for  our  sins  ac- 
cording to  the  Scriptures;  and  that  he  wras  buried,  and 
that  he  rose  again  the  third  day  according  to  the  Scrip- 
tures." The  Apostle  here  quotes  three  articles^from  the 
body  of  the  creed,  couched  in  the  very  phraseology  which 
we  still  repeat,  and  gives  them  as  a  sample  of  "the  Gospel," 
which,  he  says,  ''he  preached  unto  them."  Moreover,  he 
expressly  declares  that  he  received  this  sacred  deposit  of 
faith,  which  he  communicated  to  them.  It  was  not  his 
own.  He  had  no  power  over  it  to  mould  it  and  fashion  it, 
to  abridge  it  or  enlarge  it.  He  gave  it,  as  he  received  it, 
and  he  bids  them,  as  they  valued  their  salvation,  to  main- 
tain it  in  its  integrity. 

From  the  very  beginning  this  was  the  same.  The  first 
believers,  who  were  baptized  on  the  day  of  Pentecost,  "con- 


100 

tinued  steadfastly  in  the  Apostles'  doctrine,  and  fellow- 
ship, and  in  breaking  of  bread  and  in  prayers."  (Acts  iir 
42.)  The  faith,  the  polity,  the  sacraments,  the  worship 
came  from  the  Apostles,  and  they  had  received  them,  as 
we  know,  from  the  Lord,  and  were  commanded  by  Him  to 
communicate  them  and  to  provide  for  their  continuance 
forever.  (St.  Matt,  xxviii,  18-20.)  He,  the  risen  Lord,  just 
about  to  ascend  in  our  humanity  to  the  throne  of  God, 
gave  His  solemn  pledge  and  promise,  as  He  invested  the 
eleven  with  their  official  commission,  that  He  would  shelter 
them  and  their  successors  in  office  with  His  divine  Pres- 
ence throughout  all  time.  "Lo!"  says  He,  "I  am  with  you 
alway  even  unto  the  end  of  the  world." 

Brethren,  the  Church  is  a  divine  institution,  not  a  mere 
human  association.  It  is  constituted  by  God,  not  made  by 
man.  Its  representative  on  earth  is  the  family.  The  divine 
Master  weaves  the  family  idea  into  His  teaching  about  the 

* 

Church,  as  He  does  no  other.  We  breathe  it  when  we  say 
the  prayer  which  He  taught  us  to  repeat,  "Our  Father." 
He  roots  it  in  the  sacrament  \vhich  makes  us  His  members, 
"Except  a  man  be  born  of  water  and  of  the  Spirit  he  can- 
not enter  into  the  Kingdom  of  God."  (St.  John  iii,  5.) 

Man  can  no  more  alter  the  character  and  essentials  of 
the  Church  of  God  than  he  can  contrive  substitutes  for 
father  and  mother,  and  invent  some  new  method  of  enter- 
ing the  world  to  supersede  natural  birth.  He  seeks  to  do 
this,  and  his  efforts  are  on  exhibition  all  around  us.  He 
depraves  'the  divine  organization  into  a  voluntary  associa- 
tion, and  lowers  his  language  about  it  accordingly.  To 
him  entering  the  Church  is  joining  it  as  one  does  a  club. 


101 

To  the  divine  Master  it  is  being  born  into  it.  The  idea  of 
joining  the  Church  of  God  is  utterly  abhorrent  to  the  mind 
of  Christ.  It  is  an  utter  impossibility.  One  might  as  well 
talk  of  joining  a  family  as  of  joining  the  Church.  The  idea 
of  the  Church  is  a  closed  question.  Our  Lord  and  Sa.viour 
Jesus  Christ  has  closed  it  in  His  holy  word.  All  the  essen- 
tials of  the  Church  in  faith,  polity,  sacraments  and  worship 
are  closed  questions  for  us,  who  are  within  the  fold.  They 
may  be  and  are  to  those  without  open  questions  about 
which  one  may  think  one  thing,  and  another  maintain  the 
opposite,  and  this  must  always  be  the  case  with  them, 
while  they  refuse  the  divine  authority  of  the  Church,  and 
degrade  her  to  the  level  of  a  voluntary  association,  de- 
pending for  her  existence  and  continuance  upon  the  acci- 
dents of  human  opinion  and  preference. 

There  is  no  greater  mercy  for  which  we  have  cause  to 
thank  our  heavenly  Father  through  Christ,  beloved  Breth- 
ren, than  this,  that  it  is  not  our  sad  condition  to  be  in 
such  an  evil  plight,  where  nothing  is  settled,  nothing  is 
fixed,  but  everything  is  in  a  state  of  flux,  without  hope  of 
relief. 

It  is  true  that  there  will  often  be  within  our  ranks  of 
laity  and  clergy  those,  who  are  disloyal  to  the  faith  and 
polity  of  the  Church.  This  is  incident  to  human  infirmity, 
and  may  arise  from  many  causes,  ignorance,  perverted 
judgment,  ambition,  self-conceit,  as  well  as  downright 
wickedness.  Be  the  cause  what  it  may,  such  persons  are 
self  condemned.  The  Church  of  God  is  an  open  book  which 
may  be  read  of  all  men.  Her  faith,  her  polity,  her  worship, 
.are  published  to  the  world.  The  fact  that  they  are  closed 


102 

questions  is  self  evident.  No  man  in  his  senses  can  honestly 
think  otherwise.  There  is  not  and  there  could  not  be  in 
the  very  nature  of  the  things  concerned  any  provision  made 
for  the  revision  of  the  government,  or  the  creed,  or  the 
sacraments  of  the  Church  of  God  with  a  view  to  alteration. 
The  bare  thought  of  such  a  thing  is  ruled  out  forever. 

The  unhappy  men,  who  fall  thus  into  error  in  denying 
the  principles  of  the  Church,  whether  they  live  in  the  fourth 
century  with  Arms,  or  the  fifth  century  with  Nestorius,  or 
the  seventh  century  with  Honorius,  or  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury with  the  false  Brethren  of  our  own  day,  must  be  for 
a  time  endured.  The  Church  is  strong  and  can  afford  to 
be  patient.  But  the  time  comes  at  length  when  delay  is  na 
longer  mercy,  and  judgment  must  be  pronounced,  and  Arius 
and  Nestorius  and  Honorius,  and  nameless  ones  must  be 
cast  out,  and  become  the  subject  of  the  Church's  prayer  on 
her  knees  beneath  her  dying  Saviour  on  Good  Friday,  when 
she  entreats  that  "He  would  fetch  them  home  with  Turks 
and  infidels." 

See,  beloved,  as  touching  the  faith,  for  example,  with 
which  we  are  now  more  nearly  concerned,  how  it  is  made 
for  us  a  closed  question  to  all  honorable  men. 

When  we  are  baptized,  each  and  everyone  is  severally 
asked,  "Dost  thou  believe  all  the  Articles  of  the  Christian 
faith  as  contained  in  the  Apostles'  Creed?"  and  he  answersr 
"I  do."  When  he  is  confirmed,  after  due  and  careful  in- 
struction, he  is  asked  whether  he  still  holds  and  affirms 
this  belief,  and  again  he  replies,  "I  do."  On  this  condition, 
with  others,  he  is  admitted  to  the  Holy  Communion,  and 
virtually  renews  the  vow  every  time  he  presents  himself  at 


103 

the  Lord's  Table.  If  one  goes  forward  and  receives  Holy 
Orders,  he  is  obliged  to  present  testimonials  which  commit 
him  to  the  faith  of  his  baptism.  This  he  must  do  again 
and  again,  when  he  is  admitted  a  candidate  for  Holy 
Orders,  when  he  is  to  be  ordained  a  Deacon,  and  once  more 
when  he  is  to  be  ordained  a  Priest. 

Prior  to  his  ordination  as  a  Deacon  and  as  a  Priest,  he 
must  subscribe  the  following  declaration:  "I  do  believe  the 
Holy  Scriptures  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament  to  be  the 
Word  of  God,  and  to  contain  all  things  necessary  to  sal- 
vation; and  I  do  solemnly  engage  to  conform  to  the 
Doctrine  and  Worship  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church 
in  the  United  States."  When  he  is  ordained  Deacon,  he  is 
asked,  "Do  you  unfeignedly  believe  all  the  Canonical  Scrip- 
tures of  the  Old  and  New  Testament?"  And  he  makes 
answer,  "I  do  believe  them."  He  is  asked  again,  "Will  you 
apply  all  your  diligence  to  frame  and  fashion  your  own 
lives  and  the  lives  of  your  families  according  to  the  doctrine 
of  Christ,  and  to  make  both  yourselves  and  them  as  much 
as  in  you  lieth  wholesome  examples  to  the  flock  of  Christ?" 
And  he  answers,  "I  will  so  do,  the  Lord  being  my  helper." 
These  questions  are  substantially  repeated  to  the  Deacon, 
when  he  presents  himself  to  be  ordered  Priest,  and  in  addi- 
tion he  is  asked  other  questions,  which  close  him  in  abso- 
lutely, if  he  be  an  honorable  and  true  man,  from  contraven- 
ing and  forsaking  the  faith,  while  he  retains  his  orders. 
Thus  the  Bishop  inquires,  "Will  you  then  give  your  faith- 
ful diligence  always  so  to  minister  the  doctrine  and  sacra- 
ments, and  discipline  of  Christ,  as  the  Lord  hath  com- 
manded, and  as  this  Church  hath  received  the  same  ac- 


104 

cording  to  the  Commandments  of  God,  so  that  you  may 
teach- the  people  committed  to  your  Cure  and  Charge  with 
all  diligence  to  keep  and  observe  the  same?"  And  the  can- 
didate responds,  "I  will  so  do  by  the  help  of  the  Lord." 
On  these  conditions,  a  man  is  made  a  Christian  in  Holy 
Baptism,  and  advanced  step  by  step  to  the  privileges  of 
the  Lord's  Household,  at  each  stage  renewing  his  profes- 
sion of  acceptance  of  the  creed  of  the  Universal  Church. 
On  these  conditions,  if  the  layman  becomes  a  Priest  in  the 
Church  of  God,  he  has  been  admitted  to  Holy  Orders,  and 
advanced  to  the  high  and  sacred  office  which  he  holds;  on 
these  conditions  only,  the  compliance  with  which  he  has 
acknowledged,  with  his  own  lips,  at  intervals  with  years 
between,  again  and  again,  could  he  have  gained  this  awful 
dignity  and  honor.  It  might  reasonably  be  anticipated 
that  no  man  who  was  thus  voluntarily  bound  by  his  own 
oft-repeated  pledge  and  promise,  and  had  in  consequence 
of  his  reiterated  declaration  of  fidelity  obtained  a  position 
as  a  trusted  minister  of  the  Church,  could  trifle  with,  much 
less  deny  the  faith,  and  if  by  chance  he  was  so  unfortunate 
as  to  cease  to  believe  any  or  all  of  the  fundamental  verities 
of  the  Gospel  as  summed  up  in  the  creed,  it  might  be  ex- 
pected that  he  would  at  once,  as  soon  as  he  knew  his  own 
mind,  renounce  his  orders,  and  leave  the  ranks  of  the 
Priesthood  in  which  he  could  no  longer  honorably  remain. 
Self  evident  as  this  seems  to  be,  it  is  not  always  the 
case,  nay,  it  is  frequently  otherwise.  All  along  the  line  of 
heretical  perversions  of  the  truth,  from  Arius  down  to 
Colenso,  the  inventors  and  advocates  of  error  have  been 
found,  as  a  rule,  unwilling  to  abandon  their  positions  in 


105 

the  Church,  which  thej  obtained  on  the  condition  of  hold- 
ing and  professing  that  faith  which  they  have  brought 
themselves  in  whole  or  fn  part  to  deny.  Heresy  seems  to 
have  cast  a  blight  upon  the  moral  nature,  and  to  deaden 
and  paralyse  the  conscience.  Its  victims,  though  shut  out 
from  such  a  course  by  their  own  voluntary  and  oft  re- 
peated pledge  and  promise  to  the  contrary,  seem  to  think 
that  they  are  called  to  stay  in  a  body  whose  faith  and 
principles  they  repudiate,  and  reform  it.  They  seem  to 
fancy  that  to  them  all  questions  are  open,  as  though  they 
had  not  entered  a  system,  the  very  essence  of  whose  sta- 
bility lies  in  the  fact  that  within  its  bounds  certain  ques- 
tions are  finally  and  forever  closed.  When  such  men  are 
called  to  account  for  their  perfidy  and  dishonesty,  they  re- 
spond with  the  charge  of  persecution  and  bigotry,  and  the 
world  echoes  their  cry.  Often  such  men  occupy  positions 
which  enable  them  for  a  time  to  defy  the  Church  and 
proudly  to  cast  contempt  upon  her.  It  was  so  in  the 
fourth  century  when  Arians  occupied  the  chief  sees  of 
Christendom  and  were  supported  by  the  wealth  and  influ- 
ence of  the  Empire.  God  is  no  respecter  of  persons,  but 
men  are,  and  hence  the  heresiarch  in  a  lofty  place,  sup- 
ported by  the  rich  and  powerful,  sometimes  escapes,  while 
his  obscure  follower,  with  little  or  no  adventitious  help 
from  social  position  and  surroundings  is  called  to  account 
and  cast  out.  This  is  not  the  fault  of  the  Church,  but  is 
due  to  the  weakness  and  pusillanimity  of  those  who  happen 
at  the  time  to  administer  the  affairs  of  the  Church.  In 
the  end  God  takes  care  of  His  own;  the  gates  of  hell  do 
not  prevail  against  His  Church.  Donatism.  though  possess- 


106 

ing  at  one  time  all  North  Africa,  vanished  away:  Arian- 
ism,  with  which  St,  Jerome  said  "the  whole  world  groaned," 
was  crushed;  Honorius.  Patriarch  of  Rome,  and  his  Mono- 
thelite  associates,  in  the  Eastern  Patriarchates,  were  placed 
under  the  ban  of  Anathema.  As  in  the  past,  so  it  will  be 
in  the  future,  those  who  despise  their  spiritual  birthright 
and  scorn  God's  promises  and  blessings,  will  always  ulti- 
mately share  in  the  ruin  and  obliteration  of  "the  lost 
tribes." 

Possess  your  souls  in  patience,  dear  Brethren,  be  not 
affrighted  at  the  apparent  boldness,  nay,  audacity  of  mis- 
guided men  who  deny  the  Lord  that  bought  them,  and  re- 
pudiate the  faith  by  the  profession  of  which  they  gained 
the  places  which  they  occupy,  and  acquired  the  influence 
to  do  evil  which  they  possess.  God  will  bring  all  such  into 
judgment.  Be  not  afraid.  The  Church  is  ''the  pillar  and 
ground  of  the  truth."  She  upholds  it  by  the  authority  of 
God.  He  hath  spoken,  and  because  He  hath  spoken  and 
for  no  other  reason,  doctrine  and  fellowship,  and  sacra- 
ments and  liturgy  are  closed  questions,  questions  forever 
settled,  beyond  debate  for  us,  who  believe.  Be  not  sur- 
prised at  our  language  about  closed  questions  as  though 
such  statements  implied  limitations  upon  human  freedom. 
What  we' say  is  no  new  thing,  with  which  you  are  unfa- 
miliar. Every  science  has  its  closed  questions  for  those 
who  accept  its  teachings,  while  they  are  not  closed  for 
those  who  have  not  mastered  its  elements,  or  refuse  its 
conclusions.  Thus  the  cause  of  a  solar  eclipse  is  a  closed 
question  for  Europeans  and  Americans,  but  it  is  not  a 
closed  question  for  the  native  tribes  of  darkest  Africa. 


107 

Their  astrologers  and  necromancers  and  medicine  men  still 
indulge  in  high  debate  as  to  what  causes  the  sun  at  high 
noon  to  drape  himself  in  black.  So  precisely  for  us,  who 
believe  in  God  and  accept  Christianity,  there  are  questions 
forever  closed.  They  are  settled  by  divine  authority.  On 
that  we  rest  the  creed  of  the  Universal  Church,  which  is 
older  than  the  Scriptures  of  the  New  Testament,  on  that 
we  rest  the  same  Scriptures  as  the  word  of  God,  on  that 
we  rest  the  polity  of  the  Church,  on  that  we  rest  her  sacra- 
ments and  liturgy.  .  These  are  closed  questions  for  us  who 
believe  in  the  One,  Holy,  Catholic  and  Apostolic  Church. 
They  are  not  for  those  without,  for  the  unlimited  right, 
as  it  is  called,  of  private  judgment,  leaves  everything  open. 
Every  one  is  free  to  pick  and  choose  as  he  pleases  in  a 
sphere,  where  of  necessity  of  himself  he  can  know  nothing., 
the  sphere  namely  of  the  secret  things,  which  belong  and 
must  forever  belong  to  the  Lord  our  God.  In  this  regard 
he  is  like  the  African  savage  in  his  relation  to  natural 
science.  The  poor  negro  knows  nothing  about  nature's 
phenomena,  and  he  can  in  consequence  adopt  and  pro- 
claim whatever  theory  he  pleases  in  reference  to  everything. 
He  is  nature's  freeman.  So  those  who  are  ignorant  of  the 
Church  or  reject  her  authority,  may  roam  over  the  field 
of  spiritual  and  ethical  speculation  at  their  pleasure,  and 
adopt  and  lay  aside  opinions  and  views  as  they  choose. 
They  are  more  than  nature's  freemen,  they  are  the  free- 
men of  the  universe.  They  rise  above  all  authority,  and 
own  allegiance  to  no  law  outside  of  themselves,  and  this 
condition,  so  deplorable,  they  call  freedom. 


108 

Brethren,  be  not  envious  of  this  boasted  freedom.  It  is  in 
reality  wretched  slavery.  There  is  no  freedom  away  from 
Christ .  In  His  school,  the  Church,  we  are  under  authority, 
and  we  learn  obedience,  a  hard  lesson,  but  most  salutary, 
and  as  we  advance  in  our  spiritual  training,  continuing;  with 
the  first  believers,  steadfast  in  "the  Apostles'  doctrine  and 
fellowship,  and  in  breaking  of  bread  and  in  prayers,"  the 
conviction  gains  upon  us  more  and  more,  as  we  lift  our 
«yes  to  the  cross,  that  the  service  of  Him,  Who  died  upon 
it  for  our  salvation,  is  "perfect  freedom." 

Commending  you,  dear  Brethren,  to  the  grace  of  God,  I 
remain,  in  the  fellowship  of  the  Gospel, 

Your  Chief  Pastor  and  Servant  for  Christ's  sake, 
GEORGE  F.  SEYMOUR, 

Bishop  of  Springfield. 
SPRINGFIELD,  ILL., 

MONDAY  IN  HOLY  WEEK,  1891. 


APPENDIX  X. 


DECLARATION  OF  THE  BISHOPS  ON  CHRISTIAN  UNITY,  1886. 


Journal  of  the  General  Convention  (page  80)  1886. 
Now,  therefore,  in  pursuance  of  the  action  taken  in  1853, 
for  the  healing  of  divisions  among  Christians  in  our  own 
land,  and  in  1880  for  the  protection  and  encouragement  of 
those  who  had  withdrawn  from  the  Roman  Obedience,  we, 
Bishops  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  the  United 
States  of  America,  in  Council  assembled  as  Bishops  in  the 
Church  of  God,  do  hereby  solemnly  declare  to  all  whom  it 
may  concern,  and  especially  to  our  fellow-Christians  of  the 
different  Communions  in  this  land,  who,  in  their  several 
•spheres,  have  contended  for  the  religion  of  Christ: 

1.  Our  earnest  desire  that  the  Saviour's  prayer,  "That 
we  all  may  be  one,"  may,  in  its  deepest  and  truest  sense, 
be  speedily  fulfilled; 

2.  That  we  believe  that  all  who  have  been  duly  baptized 
with  water,  in  the  name  of  the  Father,  and  of  the  Son,  and 
of   the   Holy   Ghost,  are   members   of  the   Holy   Catholic 
Church ; 

3.  That  in  all  things  of  human  ordering  or  human  choice, 
relating  to  modes  of   worship  and  discipline,  or  to  tradi- 


110 

tional  customs,  this  Church  is  ready  in  the  spirit  of  love 
and  humility  to  forego  all  preferences  of  her  own; 

4.  That  this  Church  does  not  seek  to  absorb  other  Com- 
munions, but  rather,  co-operating  with  them  on  the  basis 
of  a  common  Faith  and  Order,  to  discountenance  schism, 
to  heal  the  wounds  of  the  Body  oi  Christ,  and  to  promote 
the  charity  which  is  the  chief  of  the  Christian  graces  and 
the  visible  manifestation  of  Christ  to  the  world; 

But  furthermore,  we  do  hereby  affirm  that  the  Christian 
unity  now  so  earnestly  desired  by  the  memorialists  can  be 
restored  only  by  the  return  of  all  Christian  communions  to 
the  principles  of  unity  exemplified  by  the  undivided  Catho- 
lic Church  during  the  first  ages  of  its  existence ;  which  prin- 
ciples we  believe  to  be  the  substantial  deposit  of  Christian 
Faith  and  Order  committed  by  Christ  and  his  Apostles  to 
the  Church  unto  the  end  of  the  world,  and  therefore  incap- 
able of  compromise  or  surrender  by  those  who  have  been 
ordained  to  be  its  stewards  and  trustees  for  the  common 
and  equal  benefit  of  all  men. 

As  inherent  parts  of  this  sacred  deposit,  and  therefore  as 
essential  to  the  restoration  of  unity  among  the  divided 
branches  of  Christendom,  we  account  the  following,  to-wit: 

1.  The  Holy  Scriptures  of   the  Old  and  New  Testament 
as  the  revealed  Word  of  God. 

2.  The  Nicene  Creed  as  the  sufficient  statement  of   the 
Christian  Faith. 

3.  The   two    Sacraments, — Baptism    and   the  Supper  of 
the  Lord, — ministered  with  unfailing  use  of   Christ's  words 
of  institution  and  of  the  elements  ordained  by  Him. 


Ill 

4.  The  Historic  Episcopate,  locally  adapted  in  the  meth- 
ods of  its  administration  to  the  varying  needs  of  the 
nations  and  peoples  called  of  God  unto  the  unity  of  His 
Church. 

Furthermore,  Deeply  grieved  by  the  sad  divisions  which 
affect  the  Christian  Church  in  our  own  land,  we  hereby  de- 
clare our  desire  and  readiness,  so  soon  as  there  shall  be 
any  authorized  response  to  this  Declaration,  to  enter  into 
brotherly  conference  with  all  or  any  Christian  Bodies  seek- 
ing the  restoration  of  the  organic  unity  of  the  Church, 
with  a  view  to  the  earnest  study  of  the  conditions  under 
which  so  priceless  a  blessing  might  happily  be  brought  to 
pass. 

A.   N.    LlTTLEJOHN, 

G.  T.  BEDELL, 
M.  A.  DE  WOLFE  HOWE. 
SAMUEL  S.  HARRIS, 
J.  N.  GALLEHER. 

On  motion,  the  foregoing  report  was  adopted,  and  or- 
dered to  be  printed,  and  communicated  to  the  House  of 
Deputies. 


APPENDIX  XI. 


ILLUSTRATIONS  OF  DR.  BROOKS'  COURSE  IN  WORD  AND  DEED  SINCE 
HE  BECAME  A  BlSHOP  IN  THE  CHURCH  OF  GOD. 


[Extract  from  Church  Notes,  May,    1892,  the   Parish  Paper   of   the 
Church  of  the  Advent,  Boston,  Mass.,  pp.  67,  68.] 

"We  could  but  feel  that  our  Easter  joy  was  tinged  with 
sorrow ;  and  we  must  express  this  sorrow  here.  We  were 
greatly  saddened  by  the  strange  words  and  action  of  our 
esteemed  Bishop,  to  whom  we  have  endeavoured  to  show 
earnest,  filial  loyalty. 

"We  had  hoped,  and  Dr.  Brooks'  earnest  supporters  last 
spring — those  who  knew  him  best — had  encouraged  our 
hope,  that  no  more  strange  utterances,  subversive  of  the 
Catholic  faith  would  fall  from  his  lips,  because  he  would 
feel  the  restraints  of  his  high  office,  and  would  therefore  be 
more  guarded  in  his  statements.  But  never  did  he  utter 
more  dreadful  words,  or  so  contradict  the  plain  teachings 
of  the  Church,  than  in  the  fourth  of  his  noon  addresses  at 
St.  Paul's  Church  this  last  Lent. 

It  was  a  severe  blow  to  many  of  his  clergy  to  hear  their 
Bishop  declare  that  every  man  born  into  this  world  was  a 
Christian  by  the  fact  of  his  birth,  and  that  therefore  there 
was  no  regeneration,  no  new  birth  in  baptism,  notwith- 


113 

standing  the  Saviour's  own  statement,  'Except  a  man  be 
born  of  water  and  of  the  Spirit  he  cannot  enter  into  the 
Kingdom  of  God? — shows  that  this  sacrament  is  more  than' 
what  the  Bishop  would  have  us  regard  it — simply  the- 
declaration  of  a  fact  already  existing.  Surely  every  earnest 
Churchman  has  a  right  to  protest  against  such  a  denial  of 
the  Church's  plainest  teaching  as  Bishop  Brooks  made  on 
this  occasion. 

We  feel  sorely  grieved  at  heart,  and  must  express  our 
grief  in  the  way  of  warning  against  such  heretical  teaching, 
even  though  it  come  from  one  whom  we  so  much  revere  in 
his  sacred  office,  and  is  uttered  in  the  words  of  his  capti- 
vating eloquence.  The  friends  of  the  good  Bishop  apolo- 
gize for  his  errors  of  statement  by  saying  that  he  is  no 
theologian  and  is  incapable  of  speaking  in  accurate  theo- 
logical language.  But  this  is  scarcely  a  fair  excuse  to  urge, 
for  the  study  of  theology  is  most  necessary  for  one  in  such 
a  position  of  guardianship  of  the  faith,  and  certainly  it 
would  be  wise  for  so  prominent  a  teacher  to  state  his  defi- 
nitions of  sacraments  and  the  like  doctrines  in  the  terms 
of  the  Prayer  Book,  by  whose  declarations  he  is  bound. 

We  have  another  cause  of  deep  grief  in  the  unwise,  even 
wrong  fraternization  of  our  Bishop  with  an  Orthodox  and 
a  Unitarian  minister  on  Good  Friday  evening  in  a  public 
service  commemorating  the  day.  We  use  our  language 
calmly,  and  call  this  action  wrong,  and  we  believe  that  it 
was  very  wrong.  The  Bishop  violated  the  letter  of  no 
canon,  but  he  did  violate  the  spirit  of  the  canons  and  the 
whole  teaching  of  the  Church  with  regard  to  the  ministry. 
-8 


114 

By  joining  with  these  ministers  in  public  service  he  practi- 
v  cally  admitted  that  they  were  as  truly  ordained  as  was  he 
himself.  And  by  uniting  thus  with  a  Unitarian  in  worship 
he  sanctioned,  as  being  legitimate,  the  teaching  of  that 
heresy  which  denies  the  Divinity  of  Christ  and  the  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity.  We  were  confidently  told  a  year  ago  by 
many,  that  they  felt  sure  that  Dr.  Brooks  would  not  thus 
violate  the  decency  of  the  Church's  ways  when  he  became 
Bishop;  but  he  seems  not  to  be  guided  by  the  advice  of 
such  friends  as  uttered  this  sentiment,  but  recklessly  does 
that  which  he  wants  to  do  despite  the  plain  teaching  of 
his  Church  as  expressed  in  her  formularies,  and  the  order 
which  she  has  thought  fit  to  observe. 

We  believe  that  our  Bishop  is  thoroughly  conscientious 
in  all  this,  and  thinks  himself  called  upon  to  be  the  leader 
in  a  great  revolutionary  movement  which  shall  completely 
overthrow  the  present  conservatism  of  the  Church,  and 
radically  change  her  foundation  principles;  and  therefore 
we  feel  called  upon  to  warn  those  whom  we  may  reach 
against  the  tendency  so  apparently  at  work,  which  we  be- 
lieve to  be  fraught  with  so  great  disaster.  Our  earnest 
prayers  will  be  offered  for  him  that  the  Holy  Spirit  may 
so  possess  him  that  his  eyes  may  be  opened  to  see  that 
the  Church  of  God  is  a  divine  institution  governed  by  di- 
vine laws  which  he  must  not  seek  to  change,  with  a  divine 
legacy  of  the  faith  which  once  delivered  must  not  be  altered 
by  mortal  man.  And  so  may  the  calamity  of  the  Church's 
overthrow,  which  now  portends,  be  averted  from  the  Dio- 
cese of  Massachusetts. 


115 

Now,  in  what  we  have  said,  no  one  can  justly  charge  us 
•with  disloyalty.  We  are  most  loyal  to  our  Bishop  in  the 
due  administration  of  his  office,  and  even  now  believe  that 
he  is  doing  what  he  thinks  to  bo  right.  But  to  our  minds, 
by  these  actions  he  is  denying  the  faith  of  the  Church  and 
seeking  to  overturn  her  discipline;  and  loyalty  does  not  re- 
quire us  to  stand  by  him  in  this.  Our  plain  duty  is  to 
warn  others  of  the  error  into  which  he  has  fallen,  and  to 
beg  their  prayers  for  him  that  he  may  be  brought  to  a  full 
knowledge  of  the  truth.  The  child  ought  not  to  approve 
•of  the  wrong  action  of  his  parent:  so  must  not  the  Priest 
say  that  the  doctrinal  error  of  his  Bishop  is  truth." 


[From  Church  Notes,  Boston,  July,  1892.] 

"The  Church  Standard"  (a  paper  published  in  Philadel- 
phia) "criticised  an  editorial  in  the  May  issue  of  Church 
Notes  concerning  certain  utterances  and  actions  of  the 
Bishop  of  this  Diocese.  While  we  thank  the  editors  for 
their  courteous  treatment  of  our  article  and  for  kindly 
publishing  a  letter  from  us,  we  must  say  a  word  or  two 
here  in  defence  of  what  we  then  said.  We  have  been  forced 
into  the  painful  position — for  it  truly  was  very  painful— of 
calling  attention  to  certain  errors  of  doctrinal  statement, 
as  we  believed  them  to  be,  and  a  particular  action  which 
we  felt  sure  to  be  wrong  on  the  part  of  the  Bishop.  These 
were  no  private  matters,  for  they  were  publicly  proclaimed 
in  the  secular  press  (and  in  one  Church  paper)  as  exhibit- 
ing the  liberality  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church.  Now, 
was  it  our  duty  to  publish  these  errors  or  to  keep  silent? 
'Charity  thinketh  no  evil';  but  charity  does  not  require  or 


116 

even  allow  us  to  say  that  a  wrong;  thing  is  right,  nor  does 
it  urge  us  to  keep  silence  concerning  that  which  is  wrong 
and  being  known  as  doing  harm.  Tt  is  doubtless  a  grave 
responsibility  for  a  priest  to  assume  when  he  criticises  his* 
Bishop,  but  if  that  Bishop  says  or  does  aught  in  contra- 
diction of  the  plainest  declarations  of  the  Church,  silence- 
on  the  part  of  the  priest  may  be  a  graver  responsibility. 
But  we  are  told  that  there  is  a  proper  tribunal  to  whom 
such  a  matter  should  be  referred.  Surely  if  our  reviewer 
will  reflect  he  will  see  how  hopeless  would  be  such  a  refer- 
ence. When  our  present  diocesan  was  elected  by  a  good 
majority  of  the  voters  of  this  diocese,  and  his  testimonials 
were  signed  by  a  much  larger  majority,  and  that  election 
was  confirmed  by  the  House  of  Bishops,  it  was  well  known; 
what  his  teaching  had  been  on  doctrinal  subjects,  and  how 
strange  had  been  his  affiliations.  Therefore,  if  the  Church, 
knowing  these  things,  had  made  him  a  Bishop,  it  were  use- 
less to  appeal  to  her  to  try  him  for  the  continuance  of 
them.  We  do  not  set  ourselves  up  as  an  authority  or  a& 
a  judge,  nor  do  we  claim  great  theological  ability,  but  we 
simply  do  this — deny  the  correctness  of  any  teaching  which 
contradicts  the  clear  statements  of  our  Prayer  Book.  The- 
Baptismal  Office  surely  teaches  that  all  men  are  'born  in 
sin,'  and  that  every  one  who  comes  to  Baptism  is  thereby 
regenerated;  and  the  Catechism  plainly  delares  that  by 
Baptism  we  are  made  'a  member  of  Christ,  the  child  of  God, 
and  an  inheritor  of  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven.'  Then  for 
any  man  to  assert  that  every  one  born  into  this  world  is 
a  Christian  by  right  of  his  birth,  and  that  Baptism  is  a 
certification  of  this  fact  already  existing,  is  surely  to  con- 


117 

tradict  'the  plain  teaching;  of  the  Church'  on  this  point, 
^nd  that  seems  to  us  dangerously  near  'heretical  teaching,' 
for  heresy  is  the  assertion  of  an  opinion  in  opposition  to 
the  authorized  doctrinal  standard  of  the  Church.  Again, 
we  have  no  doubt  that  the  Prayer  Book  and  the  Canons 
clearly  recognize  but  one  ministry  in  the  Church  of  Christ — 
that  of  Episcopal  ordination ;  and  so  affiliation  with  a 
claimed  ministry  which  has  no  such  ordination,  by  uniting 
therewith  in  public  worship  on  the  ground  of  sharing  min- 
isterial functions,  is  to  deny  the  faith  of  the  Church  as  to 
the  necessity  of  Episcopal  ordination,  and  therefore  is  to 
seek  'to  overturn  the  discipline  of  the  Church'  which  re- 
quires such  ordination  in  order  to  enter  upon  the  ministerial 
office.  This  becomes  even  a  graver  matter  when  one  of 
those  taking  part  in  the  'union  service'  is  a  'Unitarian 
Minister.'  It  does  seem  to  us  that  the  mere  sharing  in  a 
.service  of  worship  with  a  man,  and  so  recognizing  him  as 
a  minister  of  the  Church  of  Christ,  is  to  sanction  as  'legiti- 
mate' (to  be  taught)  'the  teaching  of  that  heresy  which 
•denies  the  Divinity  of  Christ  and  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity.' 
These  are  the  things  our  Bishop  said  and  did,  and  they 
pained  and  grieved  us,  but  much  more  they  wounded  the 
•Church,  and  we  felt  it  to  be  our  duty,  small  and  weak 
though  we  be,  to  do  our  utmost  for  her  healing.  We  chose 
the  channel  of  our  parish  paper  rather  than  our  pulpit, 
because  this  seemed  to  us  the  better  place  for  the  state- 
ment of  such  a  subject,  and  because  the  original  matter 
had  been  so  noised  abroad  through  the  press  of  which 
great  fraternity  Church  Notes  is  seeking  to  be  a  humble 
member. 


118 

"What  we  said  in  alleviation  of  (as  it  seemed  to  us)  the 
offence  of  our  Diocesan  was  very  really  meant.  There  is  a 
school  of  great  weight  in  our  Church,  of  which  he  is  the 
greatest  representative  in  power  of  influence  which  is  de- 
liberately and  systematically  seeking  to  overturn  the  ex- 
isting order  of  things,  and  to  refashion  the  Church  on  a 
broader  basis."  (Italics  ours.) 

"She  is  too  narrow  for  them,  and  for  her  work  as  it 
seems  to  them  indicated,  and  they  would  draw  her  out  of 
that  narrowness  and  develop  her  into  something  higher 
and  better." 

"We  do  not  know  the  other  leaders,  but  this  man  has 
our  sincerest  respect  and  esteem.  In  some 

way  inexplicable  to  us  he  leads  off  in  this  great  radical 
movement,  and  yet  feels  loyal  to  the  Church  of  which  he  is- 
one  of  the  chief est  officers.  Professing  her  faith  with  loy- 
alty, he  yet  seems  to  us  to  be  seeking  diligently  to  over- 
throw it,  in  order  to  gain  what  appears  to  him  to  be  a 
larger  and  fuller  faith.  We  exceedingly  re- 

gret our  necessary  opposition  to  him  on  certain  doctrinal 
points,  but  we  must  endeavor  to  be  as  sincere  as  we  be- 
lieve him  to  be,  and  so  loyalty  to  the  Church  requires  u& 
to  remain  firm  to  her  doctrines,  as  she  has  delivered  the 
same." 


[Extracts  from  the  Boston  Daily  Advertiser,  Friday,  April  15,  1892.] 

"Good  Friday  services:    Trinitj'  Church,  10:30  A.  M.  and 

4  P.  M.;  Old  South  Church  (Third  Church),  7:30  P.  M.    The 

pastor,    Rev.    G.  A.  Gordon,  will   be   assisted   by   Bishop 


119 

Brooks,  Revs.  A.  P.  Peabody,  S.  E.  Herrick  and  Leightoii 
Parks." 

''Those  who  remember — and  who  has  forgotten? — the  use 
that  was  made,  by  enemies  of  Phillips  Brooks  not  many 
months  ago,  of  the  fact  that  on  the  evening  of  Good  Fri- 
day, 1891,  he  took  part  in  a  certain  union  service  held  in 
the  Old  South  Church,  cannot  fail  to  observe  with  interest 
the  announcement' of  a  similar  service  to  take  place  in  the 
same  Church  this  evening,  whereat  "the  pastor,  Rev.  Geo. 
A.  Gordon,  will  be  assisted  by  Rt.  Rev.  Phillips  Brooks. 
Rev.  Andrew  P.  Peabody,  Rev.  S.  E.  Herrick  and  Rev. 
Leighton  Parks."  Those  superserviceable  friends  who 
thought  they  were  furthering  a  good  cause  by  voluable 
assurances  that,  should  the  rector  of  Trinity  Church,  Bos- 
ton, become  the  Bishop  of  the  Diocese  of  Massachusetts, 
the  Bishop  would  never  think  of  doing  and  saying  such 
things  as  the  rector  was  criticised  for  saying  and  doing, 
meant  well,  but  they  did  not  know  Phillips  Brooks  so  well 
as  they  thought  they  did." 


[From  the  Boston  Herald,  Saturday,  April  16,  1892.] 
BISHOP  BROOKS. 

''Bishop  Brooks  is  disposed  to  prove  himself  anew  to  be  a 
bigger  man  than  his  Church  by  preaching  outside  of  it,  and 
in  company  not  restricted  by  sectarian  bounds.  There  are 
men  whom  you  cannot  circumscribe  by  fixing  upon  them 
the  responsibilities  of  a  Bishop,  and  if  anyone  thought  that 
Phillips  Brooks  was  not  one  of  their  number,  he  misjudged 
his  character.  It  would  prove  a  heavy  task  to  discipline 
him  for  so  doing,  we  also  opine." 


120 

These  extracts  will  suffice  to  reveal  the  temper  with  which 
the  secular  press  of  Boston  treats  the  Church  of  God. 

I  sincerely  hope  that  it  is  painful  to  Bishop  Brooks  to 
have  his  Church  used  as  a  foil  to  set  off  his  greatness  and 
goodness  to  better  advantage. 

The  Boston  Daily  Advertiser  speaks  of  ''the  enemies  of 
Phillips  Brooks."  This  view  of  the  relation  of  almost  all, 
who  opposed  the  confirmation  and  consecration  of  Dr. 
Brooks  as  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  is  an  entire  mistake. 
There  never  has  been  one  particle  of  personal  hostility  to 
him,  nor  is  there  now.  We,  (I  speak  for  myself  and 
thousands  of  Churchmen  besides,  I  am  sure,)  are  convinced 
that  Dr.  Brooks  as  a  Presbyter,  and  Bishop  Brooks,  now 
that  he  has  been  consecrated,  has  no  moral  right  to  be 

in    our   ministry,  judging   from    his  own  acts  and  words. 

* 
His  friends  say  that  he  is,  like  Dr.  Hampden,  late  Bishop 

of  Hereford  in  England,  color-blind  as  regards  theology. 
"He  is  by  nature,  with  all  his  splendid  gifts  and  great  ac- 
quirements." say  they,  "incapable  of  understanding  and 
appreciating  theological  distinctions.  And  hence  he  cannot 
comprehend  the  situation,  the  attitude  in  which  he  really 
has  placed  himself  towards  the  Creed,  the  Ordinal,  the 
Prayer  Book  and  the  Church,  and  in  which  all  others,  who 
are  not  as  color-blind  as  himself,  see  that  he  has  placed 
himself." 

1  beg  leave  to  remark  that  I  would  not  wish  to  be  called 
the  enemy  of  my  best  friend,  because  I  opposed  his  being 
given  charge  of  a  train  of  cars  as  an  engineer,  when  I  knew 
that  he  was  physically  color-blind,  could  not  tell  green  from 
red.  Rather  I  claim  that  my  opposition  to  his  appointment 


121 

would  be  the  best  proof  of  my  sincere  friendship  for  him,  and 
my  regard  for  others.  What  would  be  likely  to  happen  if  my 
friend  were  put  in  charge  of  a  train  under  such  circumstan- 
ces? He  would  not  be  able  to  read  the  signals,  and  he  and 
his  living  freight  would  be  doomed  to  destruction,  and  the 
corporation,  who  knowingly  employed  such  an  incompetent 
official,  would  be  justly  censured  and  liable  for  damages 
for  the  loss  of  life  and  property.  This  theological  color- 
blindness may  excite  our  deep  commiseration  for  Bishop 
Brooks,  but  it  places  us  in  the  same  relation  relatively  to 
the  Bishops,  who  gave  consent  to  the  consecration  of 
Bishop  Brooks,  as  the  public  would  be  to  a  railroad  cor- 
poration, who  deliberately  employed  men  whom  they  knew 
to  be  color-blind,  to  run  their  engines.  "Theological  color- 
blindness" may  be  an  excuse  for  Bishop  Brooks,  but  where 
does  such  a  plea  place  the  Bishops  of  our  Church,  who  were 
well  -aware  of  this  fatal  defect,  and  yet  cooly,  deliberately, 
and  after  earnest  entreaty  not  to  do  so,  said  and  recorded 
their  decision,  "Let  him  be  made  a  Bishop." 

I  am  persuaded  that  almost  all  who  opposed  Bishop 
Brooks'  consecration,  and  who  now  protest  against  his 
course  as  a  Bishop,  are  his  truest  friends, — those  who 
would,  if  they  could,  save  him  from  living  and  possibly 
dying  in  a  thoroughly  false  position. 


APPENDIX  XII. 


LETTERS  OF  THE  BISHOP  OF  ALBANY  AND  THE  REV.  F.  W.  PULLER 
ON  WHAT  BISHOP  DOANE  CALLS  "THE  ALLEGED  INVITATION"  OF 
THE  REV.  DR.  BROOKS  TO  UNITARIAN  MINISTERS,  WITH  RE- 
MARKS THEREON. 


In  a  letter  of  Bishop  Doane,  published  in  the  (London) 
Guardian,  January  7,  1892,  he  speaks  of  ""the  alleged  in- 
vitation of  Unitarian  Ministers  to  the  Holy  Communion 
in  Trinity  Church,  Boston." 

This  expression,  "alleged  invitation,"  on  the  part  of  the 
Bishop  of  Albany,  fills  me  with  astonishment.  It  passes 
my  comprehension  how  Bishop  Doane,  of  all  others,  could 
be  ignorant  of  a  fact  which  \vas  notorious  at  the  time, 
(1877),  and  which  with  his  other  acts  of  anomia,  Dr. 
Brooks  says,  "was  not  concealed." 

I  may  also  say  that  the  expression,  "alleged  invitation," 
gives  me  a  little  comfort,  since  it  implies  or  gives  reason 
for  one  to  infer,  that  if  the  Bishop  of  Albany  had  known 
that  the  "alJeged"  facts  were  true,  he  would  not  have  con- 
sented* to  the  consecration  of  Dr.  Brooks,  and  now  that 
he  must  know  them  to  be  true,  he  will  change  his  course 
and  help  to  vindicate  our  Church  from  the  discredit  which 
her  Chief  Pastors  have  brought  upon  her  in  this  country. 


123 

I  confess  I  feel  some  surprise  that  the  Bishop  of  Albany 
should  have  felt  so  keenly  sensitive  to  the  invasion,  as  he 
conceived  the  recall  of  Father  Hall  to  be,  of  Episcopal  pre- 
rogatives, while  he  was  callous  to  the  awful  peril  to 
which  he  was  exposing  the  Church  of  God,  in  using  all  his 
influence  to  press  into  the  Episcopate,  a  man  over  whom 
hung  huge  black  clouds  of  doubt  as  to  his  baptism,  his 
soundness  in  the  faith  and  loyalty  to  the  principles  of  the 
Church. 

It  is  worth  while  for  the  Bishop  of  Albany,  and  those 
who  agree  with  him,  to  consider  what  the  prerogatives  of 
Bishops  would  be  worth,  when  the  belief  in  the  eternity  of 
Christ's  Person  becomes  a  matter  indifferent,  and  when  the 
Polity  of  the  Church  is  rejected  with  scorn. 

It  is 'passing  strange  that  Bishops  in  our  Church,  and 
they,  not  among  the  youngest  and  most  inexperienced, 
should  gladly  consent  to  Dr.  Brooks'  consecration,  whom 
they  knew  to  be  at  least  "an  alleged"  fautor  of  Unitarians, 
an  avowed  Pelagian,  and  more  than  an  avowed,  an  out- 
spoken and  blatant  contemner  of  Episcopacy,  and  the 
threefold  Ministry,  as  divine  institutions,  that  they  should 
gladly  consent  to  the  consecration  of  such  a  man,  and 
then  resent  with  great  indignation  the  withdrawal  by  "ul- 
tramarine" authority  of  a  Presbyter  belonging  to  another 
Diocese  than  their  own,  because  it  seemed,  and  for  all  I 
know  or  care,  may  have  been  an  invasion  in  principle  of 
Episcopal  jurisdiction.  These  Bishops  wax  hot  with  wrath, 
they  write  and  speak  with  great  intensity  of  feeling1,  they 
invoke  the  interference  of  the  Lord  Bishop  of  Oxford,  and 
raise  their  voice  in  warning  lest  a  religious  order,  which 


124 

does  not  number  a  score  of  men,  should  overthrow  Epis. 
copal  authority  and  bring  the  Bishops  of  the  Anglican 
Communion  into  contempt.  And  all  the  while  they  have 
allowed  an  awful  slight  to  be  put  upon  the  belief  in  the 
eternity  of  their  Saviour's  Person,  and  worse  than  a  slight 
to  be  put  upon  their  own  order.  The  extent  to  which  men 
can  deceive  themselves  passes  belief.  I  care  for  Episcopal 
prerogatives,  but  I  care  for  "the  faith  once  delivered  unto 
the  Saints,"  and  for  the  divine  polity  and  order  of  the 
Church  of  God,  infinitely  more.  When  the  Bishops  of  our 
Church  stand  firm  in  upholding  the  essential  verities  of  the 
gospel  of  Jesus  Christ,  Episcopal  prerogatives  will  take 
care  of  themselves.  The  crowd  whom  the  Bishop  of  Albany 
would  draw  to  the  Church  by  his  course  will  magnify  Epis- 
copal prerogatives  and  laud  him  to  the  skies  rthile  he 
pleases  them  and  does  their  bidding,  but  let  him  disap- 
point their  expectations,  or  cross  their  wishes,  and  they 
will  cry,  "down  with  Bishops,"  and  trample  his  cherished 
Episcopal  prerogatives  under  their  feet.  There  is  no  prin- 
ciple involved  in  the  support  of  such  a  constituency,  it  is 
mere  caprice,  fancy,  taste.  When  any  strain  comes,  all 
this  goes  like  chaff  to  the  winds. 


'[Letter  of  Bishop  Doane  to  the  (London)  Guardian,  Jan.  20.  1892.] 
*'Sra:  The  letter  of  the  Bishop  of  Melanesia  in  regard  to 
the  recall  of  Father  Hall,  and  the  statement  from  a  corres- 
pondent as  to  the  facts  of  the  alleged  invitation  of  Unitar- 
ian Ministers  to  the  Holy  Communion  in  Trinity  Church, 
Boston,  make  it  unnecessary  for  me  to  say  what  otherwise 
I  should  have  felt  bound  to  say  upon  these  two  points,  but 


125 

I  must  go  one  step  further  than  either  the  Bishop  has  gone 
or  your  correspondent,  because  I  am  sure  that  a  very  ser- 
ious principle  is  involved  in  this  case,  which  concerns  you 
in  England  as  much  as  it  does  us  in  America. 

"It  is  not  what  Dr.  Hunting-ton  has  cleverly  called,  "ultra- 
marine" intrusion  as  over  against  the  old  time  "ultra- 
montane" corruptions ,  but  it  is  the  fact  of  no  appeal  lying 
from  Priest  to  Bishop,  (when  such  a  case  as  this  occurs) 
which  makes  the  gravamen  of  the  whole  situation. 

"I  think  that  I  am  speaking  within  bounds,  when  I  say 
that  before  the  reformation  no  such  thing  was  known  as 
a  religious  order  with  irrevocable  vows,  in  which  the  mem- 
bers of  the  order  had  no  redress  from  the  enforcement  of 
those  vows  in  unjust  ways.  The  Bishop  of  Oxford,  to  whom 
my  appeal  was  made  (in  ignorance  of  the  statutes  of  the 
order), is  absolutely  powerless  by  those  statutes  to  deal  with 
this  particular  question,  which  means  that  in  this  reformed 
Church  of  England  we  have  allowed  religious  orders,  and 
lost  all  check  upon  their  abuse  of  power  in  the  right  of  ap- 
peal from  individual  members  of  those  orders,  in  case  of  in- 
justice done,  provided,  that  is  to  say,  that  the  appeal  con- 
cerns something  more  serious  than  a  breach  of  the  statutes 
or  of  the  rule  of  life. 

"Having  allowed  all  appeal  to  be  abolished,  it  seems  to 
me  that  we  owe  it  both  to  safety  and  to  consistency  with 
the  history  of  the  Church  in  the  past  either  to  abolish  relig- 
ious orders,  or  to  see  to  it  that  the  Bishop  of  the  Diocese 
in  which  they  exist  has  the  absolute  and  inherent  right  in 


126 

his  Episcopate,  upon  complaint  duly  made,  and  examina- 
tion duly  had,  to  revise,  and  if  need  be  to  reverse,  the  de- 
cision of  the  Superior  of  the  Society." 

WILLIAM  CROSWELL  DOANE, 

Bishop  of  Albany,  U.  S.  A. 
Albany,  New  York,  January  2d,  1892. 


Letter  of  the  Eev.   F.   W.   Puller,   in  reply.      (London)   Guardian, 
January  27th,  1892. 

"Sis:  The  Bishop  of  Albany  speaks  of  "the  alleged  invi- 
tation of  Unitarian  Ministers  to  the  Holy  Communion  in 
Trinity  Church,  Boston." 

"It  seems  to  me  that  the  time  has  come  when,  in  the  in- 
terest of  the  whole  Church  the  facts  connected  with  that 
invitation  should  be  plainly  set  forth. 

"The  facts  then  are  these:  At  the  Consecration  of  Trinity 
Church.  Boston,  certain  Unitarian  Ministers  were  invited  by 
Dr.  Phillips  Brooks,  now  Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  but  at 
that  time  Rector  of  Trinity,  to  receive  the  Holy  Communion 
in  his  Church.  They  accepted  the  invitation,  and  came  up 
to  the  altar,  and  were  communicated.  Shortly  afterwards, 
another  Unitarian  Minister,  Mr.  O.  B.  Frothingham,  took 
occasion  to  criticise  the  action  of  his  brethren  in  the  pages 
of  the  Inquirer. 

"Their  willingness  to  communicate  with  the  Church  seemed 
to  Mr.  Frothingham  to  indicate  a  very  retrograde  frame  of 
mind.  He  says  in  his  article: 

"What  shall  we  think  of  the  'liberals'  who  accepted  the 
invitation?  Were  they  looking  forward?  Were  their  faces 


127 

bathed  in  light?  *  *  *  Were  they  extending  the  circuit 
of  their  sheepfold?" 

"One  of  the  ministers  who  had  been  thus  criticised,  Mr. 
James  Freeman  Clarke  vindicated  his  conduct  in  a  letter  ad- 
dressed to  Mr.  Frothingham,  which  was  published  in  the  In- 
quirer, and  which  was  reprinted  in  whole  or  in  part  by  vari- 
ous Boston  newspapers.  The  whole  of  Mr.  Clarke's  letter 
is  given  in  the  Christian  Register  of  March  10,  1877,  a 
«opy  of  which  is  now  lying  before  me.  I  will  quote  from  it 
two  paragraphs.  Mr.  Clarke  says: 

"As  I  was  one  of  the  'liberals,'  who  accepted  the  personal 
invitation  of  Phillips  Brooks  to  stay  to  the  Communion,  I 
will  venture  to  ask  the  following  question:  Would  it,  in 
your  opinion,  have  been  more  in  accordance  with  liberal 
Christianity,  when  invited  to  an  act  of  Christian  commun- 
ion, to  have  refused?"  The  italics  in  this  quotation  are 
mine.  Further  on  in  his  letter,  Mr.  Clarke  writes  as  follows : 
4 'I  do  not  then  consider  that  the  brethren  who,  with  my- 
self, gladly  stood  for  a  moment  in  communion  with  Phil- 
lips Brooks  and  his  friends  on  this  occasion  sacrificed  any 
principle  in  so  doing.  My  face  was  toward  the  light,  for  it 
saw  in  this  act  of  my  friend  a  faint  gleam  of  the  rosy 
dawn  of  universal  brotherhood  which  is  to  come.  I  was 
looking  forward  to  a  better  day,  of  which  this  was  one 
prophecy.  The  circuit  of  my  own  fold  was  enlarged  in  that 
moment,  for  I  felt  inwardly  at  one  with  all  liberal  Christ- 
ians outside  of  so-called  liberal  Christianity.  Phillips 
Brooks  and  I  were  moving  in  the  same  direction,  for  we 
were  both  moving  toward  a  ground  of  higher  union  of 
spirit,  in  which  all  differences  of  the  letter  disappear."  In 


128 

this  second  passage  I  have  myself  italicised  the  words, 
"this  act  of  my  friend";  the  other  italics  are  Mr.  Freeman 
Clarke's. 

"I  do  not  think  that  I  shall  be  contradicted  when  I  say 
that  Mr.  Freeman  Clarke  was  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
Unitarian  ministers  in  America,  and  that  he  was  in  every 
way  a  man  of  high  character.  When,  therefore,  Mr.  Clarke 
says  that  he  "accepted  the  personal  invitation  of  [Dr.] 
Phillips  Brooks  to  stay  to  the  Communion,"  we  may,  with- 
out rashness,  conclude  that  it  is  an  indisputable  fact  that 
such  a  personal  invitation  was  given.  Whether  the  blessed 
Sacrament  was  delivered  into  the  hands  of  Mr.  Clarke  and 
his  associates  by  Dr.  Brooks  himself  is  a  matter  of  no 
moment.  Bishop  Paddock  or  one  of  his  chaplains  may 
have  been  the  actual  administrant ;  and,  if  it  was  Bishop 
Paddock,  he  was  doubtless  unaware  of  the  opinions  and 
official  position  of  those  whom  he  was  communicating. 
The  personal  invitation  had  come  from  the  rector.  Dr. 

Brooks,  and  the  responsibility  rests  wholly  with  him. 

/ 

I  feel  perfectly  certain  that  these  facts  were  not  known  to 
the  majority  of  the  American  Episcopate,  when  they  con- 
firmed the  election  of  Dr.  Brooks  to  the  see  of  Massachu- 
setts. It  is  inconceivable  that  they  should  have  knowingly 
admitted  into  the  number  of  official  guardians  of  the  faith 
one  who  had  acted  as  Dr.  Brooks  had  acted  on  the  occa- 
sion of  the  consecration  of  his  church;  unless,  indeed,  he 
had  expressed  his  penitence,  and  had  given  some  satisfac- 
tion to  the  Church  for  the  grievous  scandal  which  he  had 
caused.  Had  the  facts  been  known  the  confirmation  of  the 
election  would  have  been  rendered  impossible  by  the  loyalty 


129 

of  the  American  Bishops  to  our  Divine  Lord,  Whose  repre- 
sentatives they  are.  It  would  also  have  been  rendered  im-* 
possible  by  their  perception  of  the  inevitable  result  of  their 
initiating  such  a  course  of  action.  It  is  obvious  that  if 
the  American  Episcopate  were  to  accept  the  principle  that 
priests  who  admit  Unitarian  ministers  to  Communion  are 
proper  persons  to  be  made  Bishops,  such  an  acceptance 
would  certainly  in  the  long  run  result  in  the  break  up  of 
the  unity  of  the  Anglican  Communion.  There  are  many 
weak  points  in  our  discipline,  as  in  the  discipline  of  all 
other  branches  of  the  Church ;  but  hitherto  our  weak  points 
have  been  bearable.  The  consecration  of  Bishops  ready  to 
admit  Unitarian  ministers  to  Communion  would  be  unbear- 
able ;  and  I  am  sure  that  there  are  thousands  of  my  breth- 
ren who  would  agree  with  me  that  the  deliberate  accept- 
ance of  the  principle  of  such  consecrations  would  assuredly 
break  up  the  unity  of  our  Communion. 

"One  cannot  doubt  that  the  great  majority  of  earnest 
Church  people  would  feel,  if  the  matter  were  really  brought 
before  them,  that  Dr.  Brooks'  invitation  to  the  Unitarian 
Ministers  was  not  simply  a  wrong  act,  but  that  it  was  an 
act  destructive  of  the  foundations,  and  that  for  that  rea- 
son it  cannot  be  screened  by  the  private  letter  which  Bishop 
Paddock  wrote  to  one  who  remonstrated  with  him  on  what 
had  occurred.  Obviously  a  private  letter  could  not  cover 
a  public  scandal.  Moreover  it  is  quite  certain  that  Bishop 
Paddock,  when  he  wrote  that  letter,  was  not  aware  that 
an  invitation  to  stay  and  receive  the  Holy  Communion 
had  been  given  to  Mr.  Clarke  and  his  brethren  by  Dr. 
—9 


Brooks.  The  correspondence  in  the  newspapers,  which 
'cleared  np  the  facts  in  the  case,  occurred  afterwards.  But 
[  go  further,  and  say  that,  even  if  Bishop  Paddock  had 
known  all  the  facts,  and  had  condoned  them  in  a  public 
pastoral,  it  would  have  availed  nothing.  I  do  not  believe 
that  he  would  ever  have  acted  in  such  a  way,  but  if,  per 
impossibile,  he  had,  he  would  have  betrayed  the  trust  com- 
mitted to  him,  and  an  act  of  treason  committed  by  a 
Bishop  could  not  be  quoted  to  screen  or  cover  a  similar 
act  committed  by  a  Priest.  If  Liberius  himself,  Pope  though 
he  be,  admits  Arians  to  Communion,  there  is  only  one 
word  to  be  said  to  him  by  orthodox  Christians,  and  the 
word  was  said  long  ago  by  St.  Hilary. 

If  the  Bishop  of  Albany  should  read  this  letter  he  will 
see  what  very  grave  reasons  there  were  for  the  recent  action 
of  the  Society  of  St.  John-the-Evangelist,  and  I  think  that 
he  will  admit  that,  under  the  circumstances,  that  action 
was  justifiable,  and  that  he  will  consequently  withdraw  his 
very  drastic  proposals.  I  shall,  therefore,  refrain  from  dis- 
cussing those  proposals.  Such  a  discussion  would  certainly 
be  premature,  and  will,  I  hope,  be  needless.  I  will  only 
make  one  remark  touching  them,  and  that  is  that  they 
seem  to  me  to  justify  the  writing  of  this  letter.  Our  Father 
Superior  has  hitherto  refrained  from  asking  any  of  us  to 
write  on  the  subject  of  the  recent  trouble  in  America  in 
your  pages;  but  when  a  Bishop  comes  forward  and  appeals 
to  the  whole  Anglican  Communion  'to  abolish  religious 
orders'  generally— including,  I  suppose,  the  various  Sister- 
hoods, as  well  as  our  own  society,  and  others  that  might 
be  named;  and  when  he  suggests  as  the  only  alternative 


131 

a  course  which  would  be  fatal  to  their  existence,  and  which 
would  therefore  produce  in  an  indirect  way  the  same  re- 
sult as  direct  abolition — it  seems  to  me  that  we  may  be 
•excused  if  we  ask  to  be  heard  first  in  our  own  defense." 

F.  W.  PULLER, 
The  Mission-house,  Cowley  St.  John,  Oxford,  Jan.  22,  1892. 


The  Bishop  of  Albany  says  "that  in  this  reformed  Church 
of  England  we  have  allowed  religious  orders  and  lost  all 
check  upon  their  abuse  of  power,"  etc.  Who  the  Bishop 
means  by  "we"  I  am  unable  to  say,  but  if  he  has  in  mind 
Bishops,  I  speak  for  our  American  Church,  I  observe  that 
so  far  as  religious  orders  exist  among  us,  either  by  natural 
growth  or  by  importation,  their  presence  among  us  was 
in  opposition  to  the  wish  of  nearly  all  of  the  Bishops,  or 
at  best  by  their  sufferance  grudgingly  conceded  at  first. 
Long  years  have  passed,  and  these  orders  have  compelled 
friendly  recognition  by  their  good  works.  Notably,  Bishop 
Horatio  Potter  was  far  in  advance  of  his  generation,  and 
sympathised  deeply  with  the  movement  from  the  first;  but 
even  he  was  held  in  check  by  some  of  his  most  prominent 
Presbyters  and  by  hostile  public  opinion.  The  Bishops  can 
scarcely  with  truth  be  said  to  have  allowed  the  growth  or 
presence  of  sisterhoods  or  brotherhoods;  rather  it  would 
be  the  truth  to  say  that  they  are  here  in  spite  of  the 
Bishops. 

I  will  place  on  record  a  few  facts;  As  Chaplain  of  the 
House  of  Mercy,  New  York,  I  was  necessarily  associated  with 
the  Sisterhood  of  St.  Mary,  who  had  that  institution  under 
their  charge.  On  one  occasion,  when  I  was  accompanying 


132 

» 

the  remains  of  one  of  the  Sisters  for  interment  to  Catskill 
on  the  Hudson,  a  Presbyter  whom  I  knew  well,  and  who 
knew  me,  refused  to  speak  to  me,  and  he  sent  me  as  a  rea- 
son, afterwards,  through  a  third  party,  that  "his  declina- 
tion to  recognize  me  was  on  account  of  the  company  in 
which  he  found  me ;  he  did  not  wrish  to  compromise  himself 
by  owning,  as  a  speaking  acquaintance  even,  one  who  asso- 
ciated with  Sisters" 

Again,  in  one  of  the  earlier  annual  reports  of  the  House 
of  Mercy,  which  I  drew  up  as  the  Chaplain,  probably  the 
first,  the  trustees  objected  to  my  use  of  the  title  "Sisters" 
in  describing  those  who  were  in  charge,  and  insisted  that  I 
should  substitute  instead  "Christian  Ladies"  The  trustees- 
urged  that  the  employment  of  the  name  "Sisters"  would  so 
prejudice  the  institution  in  the  estimation  of  the  public  that 
it  would  seriously  diminish  its  income. 

Again,  the  Sisters  were  driven  from  the  care  of  the  Shelter- 
ing Arms  in  New  York  City  through  powerful  influences,, 
which  were  brought  to  bear  upon  the  Bishop  and  others, 
and  the  purpose  was  avowed  of  carrying  the  war  into  the 
House  of  Mercy,  and  I  have  reason  to  be  thankful  that  I 
was  able  to  keep  the  hostile  forces  at  bay  and  ultimately 
to  make  their  prospect  of  success  hopeless. 

Again,  Father  Benson  and  others,  Presbyters  of  the  high- 
est standing  in  our  Mother  Church  of  England  and  of  ir- 
reproachable and  saintly  lives  were  not  allowed  to  preach 
in  our  pulpits,  but  in  some  cases  were  reluctantly  permit- 
ted to  speak  in  Sunday  School  rooms,  and  in  secular 
halls. 


133 

Once  more,  a  Canon  was  passed  by  the  House  of 
Bishops  with  only  one  dissentient  voice,  and  that  was 
mine,  which  placed  religious  orders  of  women  so  absolutely 
under  the  control  of  Bishops  that  their  privacy  was  in- 
vaded, and  their  most  secret  chambers  and  their  most 
sacred  hours  were  made  subject  to  the  inspection  and  con- 
trol of  the  Rt.  Rev.  Fathers.  It  was  claimed  by  its  friends 
that  this  Canon  was  passed  unanimously  by  the  Bishops, 
.and  the  prestige,  which  this  unanimity  would  give  it,  was 
used  to  help  secure  its  passage  in  the  House  of  Deputies. 
I  was  obliged  to  come  out  under  my  signature  in  the  pub- 
lic press  and  state  that  I  voted  in  the  negative.  It  was  a 
great  relief  to  me  that  the  proposed  Canon  was  afterwards 
lost  in  the  House  of  Deputies. 

In  this  way  "we  have  allowed  religious  orders  in  this  re- 
formed Church  of  England"  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic. 
Had  our  Bishops  taken  the  matter  in  hand  at  the  outset, 
and  welcomed  religious  orders,  and  encouraged  them  and 
protected  them,  they  would  have  had  these  orders  under 
their  control,  and  the  Sisterhoods  and  Brotherhoods  would 
by  this  time  have  been  the  Bishops'  best  helpers  for  deal- 
ing with  the  problems  of  work  in  our  great  cities,  and  of 
carrying  the  Gospel  through  our  vast  mission  fields  in  the 
country. 

Twenty-five  years  ago  it  required  some  courage  and 
nerve  to  stand  up  and  say,  "I  am  the  friend  of  Brother- 
hoods and  Sisterhoods."  I  said  it,  and  it  cost  me  a  great 
deal.  But  I  have  received  a  thousand  times  more  than 
«ver  I  gave  in  spiritual  help  and  comfort  from  God. 


APPENDIX  XIII. 


PARTISANSHIP. 


Under  grave  misapprehension  some  of  our  Bishops  dis- 
tinctly charge  that  the  opposition  to  Bishop  Brooks  is  the 
expression  of  partisanship. 

I  have  sufficiently  met  and  answered  this  charge  in  the 
body  of  my  letter,  but  as  repeated  strokes  are  necessary 
in  order  to  drive  the  nail  well  home,  so  repeated  explana- 
tions are  necessary  in  order  to  clear  the  mind  of  precon- 
ceived prejudices.  Especially  is  this  the  case  when  these 
prejudices  are  popular  and  echo  the  popular  feeling. 

There  are  things  which  are  irreconcilable,  they  will  not 
tolerate  each  other,  they  cannot  dwell  together.  Such,  for 
example,  are  the  truths  embodied  in  the  Creed  and  their 
opposites,  and  preeminently  the  truth  of  truths,  that 
Jesus  Christ,  our  Saviour,  as  to  His  Person  is  Eternal,  and 
its  opposite  that  He  is  not. 

One  cannot  hold  this  affirmation  of  our  Lord  as  true, 
and  at  the  same  time  tolerate  its  denial  in  the  sphere  of 
his  belief  arid  practice.  The  bare  thought  of  such  a  thing 
is  horrible.  Nor,  on  the  the  other  hand,  can  a  man,  wha 
conscientiously  holds  that  our  Lord  is  a  mere  creature,. 


135 

unite  in  worship  with  those  who  acknowledge  Him  to  be 
very  and  eternal  God,  it  is  impossible  for  a  man  of  integ- 
rity and  honor  to  do  this. 

This  will  serve  as  a  sample.  What  am  I  saying?  Am  I 
arguing  against  the  law  of  charity  and  good  will?  Nay, 
just  the  opposite,  I  am  exercising  and  enforcing  it.  I  am 
insisting  that  truth  is  first,  and  is  never  to  be  comprom- 
ised, but  truth  is  to  be  held,  and  taught  and  practiced  in 
love.  Love  first,  last,  always. 

Persecution  1  abominate,  and  the  downtrodden  and  op- 
pressed of  any  and  every  name  would  find  no  readier  and 
more  self-sacrificing  champion  than  I  have  ever  tried  to  be 
and  am.  Let  the  attempt  be  made  to  persecute  Unitarians, 
or  Agnostics,  or  Congregationalists,  or  any  one,  and  I  am 
ready  to  do  my  very  best  in  voice,  and  with  pen  and  money 
to  resist  such  outrage  and  protect  them. 

I  mean  no  disrespect  to  those,  who  I  am  convinced  are 
wrong  in  their  belief  and  practices,  because  I  decline  to 
unite  with  them  in  their  public  worship.  One  of  the  reasons 
why  I  cannot  do  this  is  because  I  love  them,  and  I  would 
be,  so  far  as  my  influence  went,  injuring  my  fellow-men, 
were  I  by  my  example  to  tell  them  that  what  I  believe  to 
be  the  foundation  truths  of  religion,  were  not  truths,  or 
at  all  events  were  not  truths  of  sufficient  importance  that 
a  man  need  stand  for  them,  that  we  may  treat  them  as 
matters  absolutely  indifferent. 

Such  conduct  is  not  a  manifestation  of  true,  genuine  love 
for  one's  fellow-men.  It  is  really  the  opposite,  it  is  selfish- 
ness, it  is  aggrandising  one's  self  at  the  cost  of  one's  fel- 
low-men, since  it  is  misleading  them. 


130 

I  know  full  well  that  it  is  popular  to  be  indifferent  to 
truth,  to  have  a  good  word  for  every  error,  and  to  keep 
harping  upon  the  one  string  that  "we  love  all  men,  that 
our  heart  is  full  of  love  for  everybody  and  everything". 
I  know  full  well  it  is  popular  and  brings  men  applause  and 
more,  to  pose  before  the  world  as  the  apostles  of  love, 
while  they  delude  themselves  into  the  condition  of  becom- 
ing almost,  if  not  quite  indifferent  to  truth,  and  to  tell 
the  unthinking  crowd  that  "their  faith  as  they  grow  older 
grows  strangely  simple,  simpler  even  than  the  Apostles' 
Creed,  it  is  reduced  to  belief  in  Jesus  only."  I  know  all 
this  and  more,  that  fills  one  with  anguish  for  such  mis- 
guided men,  since  they  are  misguided  as  to  the  end  and 
aim  of  life,  fidelity  to  truth  and  duty.  Such  a  form-  of 
godliness  may  bring  popularity  and  with  it  gain,  but  it 
never  will,  it  never  can  bring  a  clear  conscience,  and  in  the 

V 

end  a  "well  done,  good  and  faithful  servant,"  as  a  com- 
mendation from  our  Blessed  Lord.  One  cannot  believe  in 
Jesus  without  believing  in  the  Father,  "Who  so  loved  the 
world  that  He  gave  His  only  begotten  Son  that  He  might 
be  the  Saviour  of  the  world".  One  cannot  believe  in  Jesus, 
without  believing  in  the  Comforter,  Whom  Jesus  has  sent 
and  keeps  sending  to  fill  us  with  everlasting  life.  One  can- 
not believe  in  Jesus,  without  believing  in  the  forgiveness  of 
sins,  for  Jesus  shed  His  precious  blood  as  an  atonement 
for  sin,  without  believing  in  the  resurrection  of  the  dead, 
since  Jesus  is  "the  resurrection  and  the  life";  without  be- 
lieving in 'the  life  everlasting,  since  Jesus  is  the  channel  of 
that  life,  as  the  Holy  Ghost  comes  to  us  through  Him,  the 
precious  ointment  from  the  Head  to  the  members.  What 


137 

is  to  be  thought  then  of  a  man,  who  talks  in  this  way  and 
allows  his  words  to  be  printed  and  circulated.  His  Church 
requires  him  to  demand  of  every  one,  who  is  baptised 
whether  he  believes  "a/7  the  articles  of  the  Christian  faith 
as  contained  in  the  Apostles'  Creed";  his  Church  enjoins 
upon  him.  as  he  enters  the  chamber  of  the  dying;,  to  re- 
hearse the  articles,  all  of  them,  of  the  Apostles'  Creed,  and 
inquire  of  him,  who  lies  upon  the  bed  of  death,  whether  he 
accepts  them,  in  order  that  the  sick  person  may  know, 
"whether  he  believes  as  a  Christian  man  should  or  no," 
but  this  Minister  invested  with  Holy  Orders  stands  up  in 
the  presence  of  the  multitude  and  discounts  the  faith  of 
the  Church  of  God,  nay,  the  Baptismal  formula  enjoined 
by  his  Lord  and  Master,  "in  the  Name  of  the  Father,  and 
of  the  Son,  and  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  He  stands  up  before 
the  multitude  and  poses  as  better,  more  "liberal"  is  the 
word,  than  his  Church,  than  the  Blessed  Lord  Himself,  and 
wins  applause  and  tells  men  how  he  loves  them. 

I  know  all  this,  it  is  an  old  story  and  a  very  sad  one. 
It  has  been  heard  for  many  years  and  from  the  lips  of 
more  than  one,  but  we  never  hear  it  from  a  minister  of  Jesus 
Christ  without  a  shudder.  St.  John  was  the  Apostle  of  love, 
but  was  there  ever  any  one,  who  was  firmer  and  more  out- 
spoken in  maintaining  the  faith  than  he?  His  steadfastness" 
cost  him  the  loss  of  all  things.  These  men,  in  these  latter 
days,  who  talk  so  much  about  love,  and  are  largely  indiffer- 
ent to  truth,  often  grow  rich.  Their  loud  professions  of 
liberality  as  to  God's  truth,  not  theirs,  and  love  for  every- 
body and  everything,  bring  them  popularity,  and  their 
godliness  is  sometimes  gain. 


138 

Of  course  in  the  minds  of  men,  who  are  indifferent  to 
truth,  or  to  truth  that  is  not  popular,  all  positive  affirma- 
tion of  truth  and  insisting  upon  its  consequences,  as  com- 
pelled by  the  laws  of  thought,  they  call  "partisanship,"  it 
is  not  convenient,  it  does  not  please  the  people,  and  so  it 
is  to  be  put  down,  and  they  will  try  to  put  it  down. 

Now,  let  me  ask  my  brethren,  be  they  who  they  may,  if 
objecting  to  the  consecration  of  a  man  over  whose  baptism 
hang  grave  doubts  as  to  whether  water  was  used,  and  the 
form  of  words  prescribed  by  our  Lord,  whose  acts  and 
words  proclaim  him  to  be  an  Arian  as  to  belief  in  Jesus 
Christ,  a  Pelagian  as  to  man's  natural  condition  and  rela- 
tion to  God,  and  a  Congregational!  st  as  to  Church  govern- 
ment, if  objecting  to  the  consecration  of  such  a  man  be 
partisanship,  then  what  is  not  partisanship?  I  most  em- 
phatically deny  that  there  is  any  partisanship  in  such  op- 
position. 

I  opposed  Bishop  Brooks'  consecration  because  I  am  not 
sure  that  he  is  a  baptized  man,  (and  I  had  no  means  of 
ascertaining  the  facts,)  because  so  far  as  I  could  learn  from 
his  acts  repeated  and  never  concealed,  and  his  words  printed 
in  books  and  published,  and  to  which  he  himself  referred 
me  as  evidence  of  what  he  was  in  belief  and  practice,  he  is 
as  to  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  an  Arian  of  some  sort,  as  to 
man's  natural  condition,  a  Pelagian,  and  as  to  Church  Pol- 
,ity  a  Congregationalist.  If  such  opposition  based  upon 
such  reasons  be  partisanship,  then  I  plead  guilty  to  the 
charge.  I  tried  my  best  to  give  my  vote  for  the  Bishop  of 
Massachusetts.  All  my  efforts,  which  I  made  in  good  faith 
to  enable  me  to  do  so,  failed. 


139 

As  I  now  understand  the  case,  I  would  sooner  suffer  with 
the  ancient  confessors  all  that  they  endured  than  record 
my  consent  to  the  consecration  of  a  man  occupying  the 
position  of  the  present  Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  since  if 
he  be  color-blind,  as  his  friends  allege,  as  to  theology,  it  is 
worse  than  cruel  to  him,  it  is  perilous  to  his  Diocese  and  the 
Church,  and  it  would  be  condemnation  to  my  own  soul  to 
help  to  make  him  a  Bishop. 

A  Bishop  in  our  Church  boldly  throws  all  the  responsi- 
bility of  exercising  his  judgment  in  the  case  of  a  Bishop- 
Elect  upon  the  Diocese,  which  elects  and  declares  that  he 
will  not  go  behind  the  certificate  of  the  electors  or  a  ma- 
jority of  them,  and  implies  that  those  who  do  not  follow 
his  example  are  under  the  influence  of  partisanship. 

Is  this  Bishop  aware  that  the  relation  of  Bishops  to  the 
consent  to  consecrate  is  of  the  essence  of  the  Episcopate, 
and  stands  upon  fundamentally  different  ground  from  that 
of  standing  committees  which  are,  I  mean  no  disrespect  to 
standing  committees,  a  pure  Americanism?  Is  this  Bishop 
aware  that  he  cannot  abdicate  his  responsibility  in  this 
good-natured  easy  way  inasmuch  as  the  constitution  of 
the  Church  Universal,  not  our  own  canons  merely,  holds 
him  accountable  for  every  consecration  in  his  Province? 

Is  this  Bishop  aware  that  the  call  upon  him  to  consent 
involves  his  personal  responsibility  to  the  question,  and 
that  if  there  be  any  reasonable  cause  for  doubt  it  is  his 
duty  to  give  the  Church  of  God  the  benefit  of  the  doubt, 
and  not  his  friend,  and  to  make  diligent  inquiry  until  he 
is  satisfied  that  there  is  no  ffood  ground  for  misgiving? 


140 

Is  this  Bishop  aware  that  in  cases  where  men,  accused 
by  common  rumor  of  heresy,  are  chosen  Bishops,  it  is  be- 
cause the  men  who  elect  them  are  in  sympathy  with  them, 
and  hence  their  certificate  as  to  soundness  in  the  faith  is 
worthless?  Is  this  Bishop  a  stranger  to  the  history  of 
Donatism  and  Arianism,  and  in  our  own  time  the  unhappy 
story  of  Natal? 

Was  this  Bishop  unaware  that  the  baptism  of  the  Bishop 
of  Massachusetts,  at  the  best,  is  very  questionable,  and 
not  only  so,  but  that  he  seemed  to  have  so  little  respect 
for  the  convictions,  prejudices,  possibly  Bishop  Brooks 
would  say,  of  his  fellow  Churchmen,  that  he  refused,  as  I 
am  informed,  to  have  any  defects  in  the  Unitarian  rite 
cured  by  receiving  hypothetical  baptism? 

Was  this  Bishop  unaware  that  the  Rt.  Rev.  Dr.  Brooks 
had  embodied  a  good  deal  of  his  teaching  in  published 
volumes  of  sermons  and  in  newspapers?  Had  this  Bishop 
read  any  of  these  sermons,  and  did  he  know  aught  of  the 
current  allegations  against  the  candidate  for  his  approval? 

These  questions  are  pertinent  and  they  ought  to  be  asked 
and  pressed.  There  is  the  more  reason  for  doing  so  now, 
because  attention  should  be  called  to  these  facts  in  view 
of  what  awaits  us  in  the  future. 

It  is  a  little  remarkable  that  this  Bishop,  who  in  such 
an  amiable,  easy,  good-natured  way  seeks  to  shift  the 
responsibility,  which  the  Church  of  God  puts  upon  him,  to 
the  clerical  and  lay  members  of  the  convention  which 
elected,  is  currently  reported  to  have  sent  a  cablegram 
across  the  ocean,  when  he  heard  of  the  choice  of  his  friend 
as  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  to  this  effect:  "Thank  God  for 


141 

the  election  of  Dr.  Brooks."  It  is  also  currently  reported  that 
this  same  Bishop  telegraphed  to  his  standing  committee  to 
guide  them  with  his  fatherly  adyice,  "Confirm  him,"  mean- 
ing Dr.  Brooks.  I  hope  that  both  these  reports  are  untrue, 
since  if  they  were  true  they  savor  very  strongly  of  partisan- 
ship, and  that  in  a  direction  which  is  very  painful  to  con- 
template. On  this  head  I  have  much  more  that  I  might 
say  as  to  partisanship  in  behalf  of  laxity  and  unbelief,  but 
I  forbear. 

There  should  have  been  investigation  and  satisfaction 
given  in  so  grave  a  case  before  matters  were  pushed  to 
their  consummation.  Those  in  power  refused  to  listen,  and 
while  doubtless  technicalities  were  strictly  observed,  still  it 
must  seem  to  all  sober-minded  men  hereafter  in  the  days  to 
come  when  we  are  gone  to  our  dread  account  (and  to  them 
my  appeal  lies),  that  the  arrangements  for  the  consecra- 
tion were  made  and  announced  in  hot  haste. 


APPENDIX  XIV. 


THE  APPARENT  HASTE  WITH  WHICH  'THE  ARRANGEMENTS  FOR 
THE  CONSECRATION  or  THE  REV.  DR.  BROOKS  WERE  MADE  AND 
ANNOUNCED. 


The  following  extract  is  from  the  New  York  Times  of  July 
10th,  1891,  and  is  based  upon  a  communication  sent  from 
Boston.  July  9th: 

u\ot  Yet  a  Bishop. — Phillips  Brooks  has  not  been  con- 
firmed by  the  Bishops.  BOSTO-N,  July  9. — Surprise  has  been 
felt  by  some  people,  particularly  by  the  loyal  adherents  of 
the  Rev.  Dr.  Phillips  Brooks,  that  there  has  been  so  much 
dela\7  on  the  part  of  the  Bishops  in  recording  their  votes 
in  the  matter  of  the  confirmation  of  his  election  as  Bishop. 
Thirty-five  votes  are  required  to  confirm  or  reject,  and  as 
soon  as  these  are  received  by  Bishop  Williams  he  will  notify 
Dr.  Brooks  of  the  result.  A  letter  has  come  to  this  city 
from  Bishop  Williams,  in  which  he  expresses  his  approval 
of  Mr.  Brooks,  and  that  the  votes  of  Bishops  Potter,  Lit- 
tlejohn  and  Doane  are  for  him.  Further  than  this  nothing 
is  positively  known  by  any  one  save  the  Bishop. 

While  it  is  certain  Dr.  Brooks's  election  has  not  been  con- 
firmed, it  is  equally  certain  that  he  has  not  been  rejected. 
The  delay  does  not  indicate  opposition  or  indifference  on 


143 

the  part  of  the  Bishops.  Some  of  them  are  stationed  in 
Western  Africa,  China,  Japan,  and  other  distant  countries, 
and  many  are  on  their  visitations.  As  it  is  not  obligatory 
on  any  one  to  vote,  there  is  a  possibility  that  some  may 
decline  to  do  so,  and  these  would  most  probably  be  the 
men  who  could  be  heard  from  first. 

There  is  a  well-settled  opinion  in  the  minds  of  the  best 
informed  that  the  confirmation  of  the  election  of  Dr.  Brooks 
by  the  Bishops  is  but  a  matter  of  time,  and  that  the  num- 
ber of  votes  now  needed  to  make  him  a  Bishop  is  very 
small  indeed."— N.  Y.  Times,  July  10. 

Five  copies  of  the  New  York  Times  of  the  above  date 
were  sent  to  me  anonymously  during  the  week  following 
its  publication. 

I  referred  to  this  paragraph  in  a  letter  to  the  Bishop  of 
Albany,  not  to  complain  of  the  alleged  facts  in  any  way, 
but  for  a  very  different  purpose,  and  the  Bishop  replied, 
ignoring  all  reference  to  the  point  which  I  made  in  sub- 
mitting the  extract  to  him,  and  dwelt  upon  his  explana- 
tion of  the  paragraph,  that  it  was  based  upon  the  Pre- 
siding Bishop's  official  letter,  taking  order  for  consecration 
and  making  the  appointments  and  assigning  the  duties. 

Of  course  we  accept  this  as  the  true  solution  of  the  extra- 
ordinary announcement.  But  it  would  be  very  difficult  for 
any  one,  unless  he  was  aided  by  personal  knowledge  of  the 
parties  concerned,  to  read  such  an  explanation  between  the 
lines  of  the  above  paragraph. 

I  reproduce  it  simply  for  the  purpose  of  showing  the  great 
haste  with  which  the  announcement  of  the  consecration, 
and  of  arrangements  for  the  same,  were  made. 


144 

The  thirty-five  consents  constituting  a  majority  of  the 
Bishops  entitled  to  vote,  were  not  received  earlier  than 
July  6th  by  the  Bishop  acting  as  assessor  to  the  Presiding 
Bishop,  whose  address  was  Portland,  Maine,  and  he  had  to 
communicate  the  result  to  the  Presiding  Bishop  at  Middle- 
town,  Conn.,  and  he,  as  required  by  Canon,  must  notify 
the  Bishop-Elect  at  Boston,  and  then  when  the  Bishop- 
Elect's  consent  is  received  by  the  Presiding  Bishop,  he"  is 
in  a  condition  to  take  order  for  Consecration,  and  not 
till  then. 

All  this  must  be  done  between  the  6th  and  9th  of  July. 
It  was  possible,  nay  by  the  aid  of  the  telegraph  easily  ac- 
complished, I  suppose,  but  it  shows  that  the  utmost  dis- 

te 

patch  was  used  in  deference  to  the  pressure  from  without. 

CONCLUSION. 

It  is  well,  in  the  end,  to  gather  up  in  few  words  what  one 
has  said,  and  state  his  purpose  in  saying  it. 

I  affirm  then,  from  the  best  information  that  I  can  gain, 
and  the  testimony  on  which  1  chiefly  rely  is  that  to  which 
the  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  himself  refers  me,  his  own 
acts  and  words,  that  our  Bishops  have  admitted  to  the 
Episcopate  one 

1.  Whose  baptism  is,  so  far  as  I  have  been  able  to 
learn,  extremely  doubtful  as  to  matter  and  form,  since  the 
service  was  performed  by  a  Unitarian  Minister,  and  the 
Bishop  cares  so  little  about  it,  and  the  anxiety  and  dis- 
tress in  consequence  of  the  uncertainty  attaching  to  his 
status  as  an  alleged  Christian,  that  he  refused  to  have  any 


145 

defects  cured,  which  might   exist,  by  submitting   to  hypo- 
thetical baptism. 

2.  Whose  relation  to  the  Catholic  Faith,  as  summed  up 
in  the  Nicene  Creed,  is  that  of  an  Arian  of  some  sort,  who 
denies  the  eternity  of  the  Personality  of  Jesus  Christ,  since 
only  thus  can  one  reconcile  his  inviting,  not  simply  receiving 
but  inviting  professed  teachers  of  Unitarianism  to  receive 
the  Holy  Communion.     I  omit,  for   the   present,  all  refer- 
ence to  his  relation  to  the  doctrines  of  the  Personality  and 
Divinity  of  the  Holy  Ghost. 

3.  Whose  relation  to  the  Polity  of  the  Church  as  summed 
up  in  the  Ordinal  is  that  of  one  who  rejects  it  and  regards 
it  with  contempt,  and 

4.  Whose  relation  to  man's  natural  condition  as  he  is 
born  is  thai;  of  a  Pelagian,  since  he  teaches   that   all  men 
are  by  nature  members  of  Christ,  the  children  of  God  and 
inheritors  of  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  that  is  that  all  the 
.human  race  is  Christian. 

I  have  not  been  arguing  against  these  positions  of  Bishop 
Brooks,  in  the  abstract  that  they  are  wrong,  but  I  have 
been  saying  that  holding  these  positions,  he  has  no  moral 
right  to  be  in  the  ministry  of  the  Church,  and  that  the 
Bishops  had  no  moral  right  to  admit  him  while  holding 
these  views  to  the  Episcopate. 

While  Bishop  Brooks  was  a  Presbyter  I  had  no  direct 
relation  to  him,  and  could  not  well  interfere  with  his  teach- 
ing and  practice,  but  when  he  became  a  Bishop-elect,  then 
he  was  brought  directly  by  the  Canons  of  our  Church  in  re« 
lation  to  me,  and  I  was  made  responsible  as  an  individual 

—10 


148 

Bishop  for  him  and  his  teaching1  and  conduct,  and  I  am 
and  must  continue  so  responsible  until  I  have  exhausted 
every  possible  resource  to  protect  the  Person  of  our  ador- 
able Lord  from  awful  indignity,  the  Faith  of  the  Church 
from  depravation,  the  Polity  of  the  Church  from  destruc- 
tion, and  the  rudimentary  principles  of  the  Gospel  from 
denial  and  overthrow.  This  I  have  in  my  very  humble  way 
striven  to  do,  and  mean  with  God's  help,  so  far  as  I  can, 
to  continue  to  strive  to  do. 

It  may  be  said,  and  will  be  said,  why  disturb  the  peace 
of  the  Church,  now  that  all  is  over,  by  this  discussion? 
My  answer  is  I  am  not  responsible  for  disturbing  the  peace 
of  the  Church,  the  responsibility  rests  upon  those  who,  1 
may  say,  pushed  the  Bishop-elect  into  the  Episcopate  with 
haste,  and  upon  him  who  is  now  Bishop  of  Massachusetts 
for  his  acts  and  words,  as  it  would  seem  of  bravado  since 
he  has  been  consecrated. 

The  peace  of  the  Church  !    What  is  the  peace  of  the  Church 

\ 

worth  in  comparison  writh  the  Church  Herself? 

The  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  as  I  view  the  issue  now 
with  his  magnificent  presence,  with  his  eloquence,  with  his 
influence,  with  his  following  of  men  and  women,  and  with 
his  resources  of  money  marches  forth  and  defies  the  Church 
of  the  Living  God,  the  old  Church  with  her  worn-out  Creed, 
her  useless  Articles,  her  worse  than  useless  Ordinal  as  he 
regards  them,  and  proposes  to  give  us  a  new  Church  of  his 
own  invention  and  construction.  He  it  is,  and  my  Brethren 
of  the  American  Episcopate  who  have  placed  the  Rt.  Rev. 
Phillips  Brooks  where  he  is,  who  are  responsible  for  dis- 
turbing the  peace  of  the  Church.  I  must  abide  in  my  lot 


147 

and  do  what  I  can  with  my  slender  resources,  and  leave 
the  result  with  God.  Every  attempt  will  be  made  to  evade 
the  issue  and  turn  away  the  public  mind  from  the  real 
facts  of  this  case,  but  in  the  end  all  such  efforts  will  fail. 

My  contention  is  that  a  man  whose  baptism  at  the  best 
is  very  doubtful,  whose  relation  to  the  incarnation  of  Jesus 
Christ  is  that  of  an  Arian,  whose  attitude  towards  the  form- 
ulated polity  of  the  Church  is  that  of  qne  who  refuses  it 
and  despises  it,  and  whose  avowed  belief  as  to  man's 
natural  condition  contradicts  the  teaching  of  the  word  of 
God,  and  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer,  is  now  a  Bishop 
of  our  Church  by  the  votes  of  a  majority  of  my  Breth'ren 
in  the  Episcopate. 

This  is  my  contention,  and  I  do  not  propose  to  be  turned 
aside  from  the  issue.  I  appeal  from  the  action  of  my 
Brethren  who  have  deliberately  and  in  spite  of  entreaty 
and  remonstrance  made  the  Et.  Rev.  Dr.  Phillips  Brooks 
a  Bishop  in  the  Church  of  God,  I  appeal  from  their  action 
in  the  first  instance  to  the  Bishops  of  the  Anglican  Com- 
munion throughout  the  world,  and  ultimately  my  appeal 
must  go  to  the  judgment  of  the  last  great  day,  to  God 
Himself. 


NOTE. — It  is  important  for  me  to  observe  that  up  to  the  present 
moment,  it  is  not  in  my  power  to  give  anything  like  an  exhaustive 
list  of  those  who  gave  or  refused  their  consent  to  the  consecration 
of  Bishop  Brooks.  Of  six  or  seven  affirmative  votes  1  am  quite 
sure.  Beyond  that  number  I  could  not  go  and  say  that  I  knew 
that  such  and  such  Bishops  recorded  their  consents. 

In  a  crisis  like  the  present,  which  concerns  the  stability  of  our 
branch  of  the  Church,  it  seems  to  me  a  cruel  wrong  to  the  Church 
that  those  in  authority  should  feel  themselves  justified,  in  deference 
to  what  they  call  "custom"  (lex  non  scripta),  to  withhold  from  a 
brother  Bishop,  on  his  application,  the  names  of  those  Bishops  who 


148 

agreed  with  him  in  action,  when  such  information  was  sought  not 
from  curiosity  or  for  publication,  but  with  a  view  to  consultation  as 
to  what  was  best  to  be  done  under  the  circumstances.  I  was  left 
alone,  and  did  my  best,  and  am,  according  to  my  light,  doing  my 
best  to  'neutralize,  as  far  as  I  can,  the  most  dreadful  calamity  which 
can  befall  the  Church  of  God  in  any  land.  In  such  an  exigency,  the 
words  of  our  Lord  come  right  home  to  one  (St.  Matt.  x.  37):  "He 
that  loveth  father  or  mother  more  than  Me,  is  not  worthy  of  Me :  and 
he  that  loveth  son  or  daughter  more  than  Me,  is  not  worthy  of  Me." 

I  must  put  behind  me  all  human  claims,  all  ties  of  friendship,  of 
the  closest  relationship,  even,  and  count  them  as  nothing  in  com- 
parison with  the  paramount  claim  of  Jesus  Christ,  our  Lord  and 
Saviour. 

The  issue  presented  now  is  the  great  world-power,  magnified  and 
strengthened  by  modern  thought  and  progress,  arrayed  against  the 
Catholic  Church,  resting  on  her  eternal  foundations.  With  all  its 
sophistries  of  humanitarianism,  and  love  for  Christ,  and  care  for 
man's  needs.  Satan  is  behind  this  world-power.  Christ  is  in  His 
Church,  and  though  the  conflict  be  long  drawn  out,  and  fearful  in  its 
waste  of  spiritual  life  and  ruin  of  souls,  still  the  gates  of  hell  shall 
not  prevail  against  the  Church.  No !  thank  God,  we  are  sure  of  her 
final  triumph  ;  but  meanwhile  in  this  land — here,  now, — the  issue,  in 
its  last  analysis,  will  be  Christ  or  antichrist,  and  everyone  must 
make  his  choice — must  take  sides. 


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